Silicon Prairie Cyber Services' Blog

Let’s talk about phishing emails and impersonation. Hackers often use impersonation to get you to open their phishy emails. If the email is from someone you know you’re more likely to open it. For many years, Microsoft was the most impersonated company in phishing emails. It makes sense, I mean, what big business doesn’t use Microsoft? But there’s a new winner, and it’s DHL. In Q4 of 2021, DHL was the most impersonated company in phishing emails, thus dethroning Microsoft? Why the spike? Bad guys follow the money. Q4 means shopping, and with spikes in online shopping again last year, it only made sense that even more cherished Christmas presented would be shipped. How does it work? The attacker used a from name of ‘DHL Customer Support’ The Subject contains ‘DHL Shipment Confirmation…’ It works, because who doesn’t want to know where their package is?! Beware, DHL wasn’t the only shipping server that’s impersonated. FedEx entered the top 10 list as well. How can your cybersecurity awar...

  Hey  Ah, Valentine’s day. The holiday of love is quickly approaching. All this love in the air can only mean one thing, catfishing scams are ramping up. What's catfishing? Fraudsters try to take your money by pretending to be a love interest or playing on your emotions. It normally starts off as a direct message on social media or email, but it even happens on dating websites. A catfish scam can quickly ruin your Valentine’s Day. Not only did you get tricked, emotionally kicked in the gut, you also probably lost a lot of cash. Avoid heartache by watching out for these catfishing red flags: A new social media profile with very few friends They never want to show their face on video or meet in person Super fast expressions of love Sudden Major Expenses - and they ask you to help fund it They were going to finally meet you in person, but now this super horrible thing suddenly happened and they can't. They'll ask you for money to fix their car or pay that doctor's bill! G...