Domain spoofing, payment scams and other dangerous tricks are major threats during the holiday season
KnowBe4, the provider of the world’s largest security awareness training and simulated phishing platform, today announced it has released a set of the top five cybersecurity tips to help protect end users against a variety of dangerous scams during the 2022 holiday season.
Every year during the holiday season, people fall victim to holiday scams contributing to millions of dollars lost. The FBI says that the most popular holiday scams in the last year are phishing scams, alongside voicemail-based phishing, known as vishing, SMS phishing, known as smishing and redirecting users from a legitimate website to a malicious website, known as pharming. These scams use unsolicited emails, text messages and phone calls appearing to come from legitimate companies that request personal, financial and/or login credentials. According to the Internet Crime Complaint Center’s (IC3) 2021 report, phishing scams affected more than 320,000 people last year and amounted to more than $44 million lost.
Here is a list of the top 5 cybersecurity tips for the 2022 holiday season:
- Pay close attention to the websites you visit and where you shop. Verify links before clicking and keep an eye out for unfamiliar or misspelled domains, especially on a website you have never heard of.
- Make sure to use a credit card for online purchases and monitor the card regularly for fraudulent or suspicious activity.
- Use strong, unique passwords on all accounts. Ensure that you do not reuse passwords across different websites and use a password that is not easily guessable. Cybercriminals know that if they get one password, it is likely to work in other places. Password managers are a great tool for storing passwords safely.
- Be careful and wary of messages regarding travel changes. Always use official channels and domains to stay updated.
- Enabling phishing resistant multi-factor authentication on email, shopping and social media accounts whenever possible is a positive extra step that end users can take to better protect their accounts.
“Phishing, in all its forms, continues to plague people all year long, but especially during the holiday season,” said Stu Sjouwerman, CEO, KnowBe4. “It is imperative to stay vigilant and hyper-aware of potential scams now more than ever, as cybercriminals are counting on end users to have their guard down during this time of year. Keeping these five tips in mind is recommended to ensure a stronger cybersecurity defense for a safe and secure holiday season.”
For more information on protecting against holiday scams, download KnowBe4’s 2022 Holiday Resource Kit: https://www.knowbe4.com/holiday-resource-kit.
About KnowBe4
KnowBe4, the provider of the world’s largest security awareness training and simulated phishing platform, is used by more than 54,000 organizations around the globe. Founded by IT and data security specialist Stu Sjouwerman, KnowBe4 helps organizations address the human element of security by raising awareness about ransomware, CEO fraud and other social engineering tactics through a new-school approach to awareness training on security. Kevin Mitnick, an internationally recognized cybersecurity specialist and KnowBe4’s Chief Hacking Officer, helped design the KnowBe4 training based on his well-documented social engineering tactics. Tens of thousands of organizations rely on KnowBe4 to mobilize their end users as their last line of defense.
