Phishing Accounts for 67% of Malware Attacks During 2017 Q2 According to Report

According to a Global Threat Intelligence Center (GTIC) report released this month by NTT Security, organizations hit with malware during the second quarter of the year were delivered via phishing attacks in 67% of the cases.

Phishing attacks have been a growing nuisance for many years as hackers who initiate such attacks have evolved to push more sophisticated methods to trick computer users. The technique of phishing is traditionally known as the fraudulent act of sending emails that pretends to come from trusted or reputable sources only to trick computer users out of their passwords, credit card details, and other personal information. Not only have recently evolved phishing attacks been responsible for stealing personal information, but they have so accounted for the proliferation of new malware threats, such as ransomware.

In GTIC's 2017 Q2 Threat Intelligence Report, data has uncovered cases were the most prevalent method of delivering malware. Even so much so that 67% of malware attacks are suspected to come from phishing alone during the second quarter of 2017.

The data gathered in GTIC's 2017 Q2 Threat Intelligence Report compares previous years where attacks aimed at the end user utilizing aggressive phishing techniques has increased drastically. Furthermore, many computer security experts and researchers have been busy examining the spread of threats like ransomware and the ever-so-slightly increases of DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks on web servers. Now, in revealing that phishing attacks are making up the majority of the malware-spreading landscape, heads are turning in surprise where cybercriminals are now targeting the vulnerable that permits a quick kill instead of attacking the juggernauts that we know to have strong cybersecurity infrastructures.

Quick and Easy Targets are all the Rave

Fundamentally, cybercriminals are going after quick targets where it can take as little as 10 minutes to generate a clever phishing email to entice a potential victim to click on a malicious link or download a malicious attachment. Malware spread through such methods are known to install malware permitting remote access to the attacked computer. By seeking the quick attack, the cybercrooks don't have to waste valuable time conjuring at complicated exploit method, which could take days to weeks to master.

The malicious attachments that NTT Security has found and somewhat revealed in GTIC's 2017 Q2 Threat Intelligence Report are ones that have embedded VBA macros that harbor obscure PowerShell commands. Within those commands, they commonly initiate the download of malware onto the attacked computer. The VBA macro process strongly relies on Windows tools for the malware payload download.

Not all Phishing Attacks are created equal

To the surprise of many, a good portion of the phishing attacks reviled in GTIC's 2017 Q2 Threat Intelligence Report, about 33% of the total, were reconnaissance type attacks where scans of systems were conducted to discover vulnerabilities. 22% of the attacks were Brute-force, and attacks on manufacturing industries and malware accounted for only 9% of the whole.

Among the countless vulnerabilities that have been discovered, Adobe Flash remained to be a culprit among many where a remote execution bug (CVE-2016-4116) was the brunt of recent attacks. Even though the Adobe vulnerability was patched last year, it remains to be a target for recent phishing attacks where as many as 57% of the targeted campaigns utilized the vulnerability successfully.

While there are many steps to take to avoid the crosshairs of hackers who look to exploit you and your computer through common Adobe vulnerabilities, it is best to be aware of recent aggressive phishing techniques. Even though Adobe Flash will face its demise in 2020, it's essential that your voluntary abandonment of Adobe Flash take priority to lower your risk of becoming the next victim of an aggressive phishing scheme that leverages known vulnerabilities within Flash.