WHAT IS EMAIL BOMBARDMENT?

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An email bombing is an attack on your inbox that involves sending massive amounts of messages to it. Sometimes these messages are incomprehensible. But more often, they will be confirmation emails for newsletters and subscriptions. Thus, in the latter case, the attacker uses a script to search for forums and newsletters on the internet. Then they sign up for an account with your email address. Each will send you a confirmation email, asking you to confirm your address. Also, this process is repeated on as many unprotected sites as the script can find. The term Email Bombing or Email Bombing; it can also refer to flooding an email server with too many emails. In an attempt to overwhelm the server and disable it. But that's not the goal here; it would be a challenge to cut down on the modern email accounts used. Meanwhile, Google or Microsoft email servers, anyway. So instead of a denial of service (DOS) attack; against the email servers you are using. Also, the flood of messages...
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EMAIL PROTECTION IS A MUST

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When we were children, many of us learned from our families or teachers not to talk to strangers. Yet somehow, in the virtual world of the Internet, people seem to have forgotten this essential security lesson and willingly participate in information exchanges via email with "strangers." This puts your customers, your data, and your organization in general at risk.

email protection

It seems that every day a new type of phishing attack or malicious spam attack is making headlines. More recently, a new form of malware called German Wiper has primarily targeted German companies. Like most malicious programs, it messes with victims' files and demands payment for their safe return. However, instead of encrypting data like traditional ransomware, this non-traditional form of ransomware rewrites a user's files into zeros and ones, ultimately destroying the data.

So how can you help your business avoid being the next victim of a data breach due to phishing, malware, and other predatory tactics? Following the security practices for the use of your email.

1. Create a comprehensive cyber security plan that has email

Having a developed and comprehensive cyber security plan can help your business avoid or be prepared to face many of the threats lurking online. No matter how big or small your organization is, if you don't have a cybersecurity plan yet, you should get one now.

Your cybersecurity strategy should include guidelines, policies, recommendations, and requirements regarding the implementation and use of technology. This includes email communications.

2. Regularly conduct cyber awareness training for your employees

Cybersecurity awareness training is vital for every employee at every level in every organization. It doesn't matter if you are a multi-national company or a small family business, whether you work as a CEO, a middle manager or a personal assistant, you are still a potential target for cybercriminals. This means that you must be able to react appropriately to email-based threats.

When one of your employees receives a phishing email with some kind of attachment, there are two main ways to respond:

The end user interacts with the attachment, allowing their computer or device to become infected with malware, which can lead to a breach of your network or even a ransomware attack.

They choose to mark the email as junk or spam, perhaps even taking a moment to send an email to your company's IT team to let them know what just happened.

As the example above shows, effective computer security training can help your employees learn to safely identify and handle spam and phishing emails. This includes training them to properly flag spam and other malicious emails. However, it is essential to emphasize that this training is not a one-size-fits-all solution. It is something that has to happen continually because email scam tactics have evolved. In fact, some phishing emails are so compelling that they can fool even seasoned IT security experts.

The decision to implement the training is up to you: some companies prefer to offer self-training materials online or in print, others prefer face-to-face or an integration of the two methods. Do what works best for your company and your employees. Just be sure to continue to do so and to regularly test your employees with phishing simulations.

Cybersecurity awareness is like a muscle - the more you work it and keep it engaged, the stronger you get. If you become complacent, you will see your employees' sense of cyber awareness "warp" and become ineffective, leaving your organization defenseless against email-based cyber threats. I'd say no one wants that, but you'd be lying - cybercriminals expect exactly that.

3. Invest in quality antivirus

Many antivirus programs come equipped with many features such as mail filters, file scanning capabilities, etc. If so, put these capabilities to work now. These tools can help you identify some forms of malware and other threats by preventing your devices or network from being infected.

Take the time to familiarize yourself with all the functions of your antivirus program. This way, you are not paying for a system and you end up leaving some of its benefits unused. Also be sure to include information about the antivirus program as part of your employee cyber training. After all, what good is having a solid antivirus program if your employees are just going to ignore it?

4. Create email blacklists and whitelists

If you still don't maintain a current list of banned email addresses (a blacklist), what are you waiting for? This list helps prevent known spammers or cyber threats from reaching your inbox.

Almost as important is what is known as a whitelist, or the list of email addresses that are allowed through your filters and server. This list can also be maintained through those same three components (domain, email address, and IP address / range).

5. Use strong, hard-to-guess passwords

Cyber-attacks often involve credential compromise because it provides the greatest access for the attacker.

A strong password is one that:

Includes a mixture of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols.

Avoid using words which will be found within the dictionary.

It does not include the names of your pets, family members, favorite teams, or other information that you can easily find on your social media profiles.

Password guessing tools can send hundreds or even thousands of words per minute in brute force attacks.

6. Use the S / MIME protocol for encoding and email signing

What if there was a way to prove your identity to your email recipients while helping to protect the integrity of your data? That's the job of S / MIME, or the "Multipurpose / Secure Internet Mail Extensions Protocol (S / MIME)", an email security best practice.

This term refers to an email signature protocol that increases email security by:

Create a time-stamped digital signature to confirm the identity of the sender to the recipient;

Encrypt and decrypt the content of emails to provide protection of data at rest and in transit; and

Facilitate the secure exchange of documents over networks.

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