While the world is busy fighting against COVID-19, there is a section of cyber criminals who are exploiting the situation for lucrative benefits. They are taking advantage of the efforts made by organizations to sustain their operations during this pandemic. The cyber security attacks include phishing attacks, data breach, ransom, etc.

In order to defend your organization against cyber security threats during COVID-19, it is first important to understand the reasons that have resulted in an increase in cyber-attacks. Following are the 5 top reasons:

  • The foremost reason is that the employees are working from their home networks and their personal devices. These networks and devices are usually not updated with latest antivirus or operating system versions. The lack of a properly patched and protected system results in vulnerabilities leading to easy access for hackers.
  • The second reason that has led to an increase in the number of the cyber-attacks is the flow of organizational data. When employees work from their homes, sensitive organizational data travels outside the secure network of the organization. Additionally, while working with this data, employees tend to save it on their personal devices. This allows for easy data theft.
  • The third reason is that employees need to access the organization’s network to complete their work. This remote access may be insecure. Some organizations have already established a VPN for remote access. But again all the employees are not trained to install or use a VPN. Such untrained personnel pose a cyber-security threat when they access the organization’s network. On the contrary, there are some organizations that do not have a VPN setup for remote access. This may cause a cyber-threat of greater magnitude.
  • Fourth reason that has caused a rise in the number of cyber-attacks is an organization’s requirement to keep the employees involved and informed. The regular team meetings that were conducted to discuss the team operations have been replaced by online meetings. Organizations are making use of conference video calls or unique apps like ‘Zoom’ to conduct these meetings. The shift has been hasty and not all the involved employees are aware of how to use these apps securely. Insecure logins, poorly managed user credentials and login via an insecure network are some factors that have led to cyber-attacks such as video call hacking.
  • Fifth reason accounts for unauthorized access to an organization’s funds. The underlying reason is the need of the time to do things differently. A simple example of such an attack is that an employee receives an email from a fake account created on behalf of senior personnel in the organization. The email may instruct the employee to transfer funds to an account in lieu of some organizational purchase. Since employees may not be able to validate such emails, they may end up transferring funds to the hacker’s accounts.

In order to prevent such attacks, the organizations need to educate the employees to update their systems, download antivirus updates, secure their login details, use secure VPN to access the organization’s network and be aware of fake emails.

For more information on cyber security threats during COVID-19, contact Centex Technologies at (254) 213 – 4740.