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Cybersecurity Best Practices

Cybersecurity Best Practices for Employees in 2026

Your Employees Are the Breach — 68% of the Time The 2024 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report found that 68% of breaches involved a non-malicious human element — someone clicked a phishing link, reused a password, or misconfigured a system. That number has held stubbornly steady for years. If you're

Carl B. Johnson Apr 26, 2026 5 min read
Group Online Svindel

Group Online Svindel: How Organized Fraud Rings Work

A Single Fraud Ring Stole $6 Million Before Anyone Noticed In 2023, the FBI's IC3 received over 880,000 cybercrime complaints with losses exceeding $12.5 billion — a 22% increase from the prior year. A growing share of those losses came from coordinated fraud operations, not lone hackers

Carl B. Johnson Apr 26, 2026 5 min read
Ransomware Recovery Steps

Ransomware Recovery Steps: A Battle-Tested Playbook

In February 2024, Change Healthcare — a subsidiary processing roughly one-third of all U.S. medical claims — was hit by the ALPHV/BlackCat ransomware group. The attack disrupted pharmacy operations nationwide for weeks, cost UnitedHealth Group an estimated $872 million in the first quarter alone, and exposed the personal health data

Carl B. Johnson Apr 25, 2026 5 min read
Incident Response

How to Respond to a Cyberattack: A Practical Guide

In February 2024, Change Healthcare — the largest medical claims processor in the United States — was hit by the ALPHV/BlackCat ransomware group. The attack disrupted billing systems for hospitals and pharmacies nationwide for weeks. UnitedHealth Group later confirmed the breach affected approximately 100 million individuals. If you think your organization

Carl B. Johnson Apr 25, 2026 5 min read
Whaling Attack

Whaling Attack Cybersecurity: How CEOs Get Hacked

The CFO Who Wired $25 Million to a Threat Actor In early 2024, a finance worker at engineering firm Arup was tricked into transferring $25 million after attending a video call with what appeared to be the company's CFO and other colleagues. Every person on that call was

Carl B. Johnson Apr 24, 2026 5 min read
Zero Trust Network Access

Zero Trust Network Access: A Practical Guide for 2026

The Breach That Started Behind the Firewall In 2023, MGM Resorts lost an estimated $100 million after a threat actor social-engineered their way past the help desk with a single phone call. The attacker didn't punch through a firewall. They didn't exploit some exotic zero-day. They

Carl B. Johnson Apr 24, 2026 5 min read
FakeEmail

FakeEmail Attacks: How Spoofed Messages Bypass Filters

In 2023, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that business email compromise — the category that includes fakeemail schemes — caused over $2.9 billion in adjusted losses across roughly 21,489 complaints. That made it the single most financially damaging cybercrime category in the IC3's annual

Carl B. Johnson Apr 24, 2026 6 min read
cyber security

Cyber Security in 2026: What Actually Works Now

The Breach That Changed How I Think About Cyber Security In February 2024, Change Healthcare suffered a ransomware attack that disrupted insurance claims processing for nearly every hospital and pharmacy in the United States. UnitedHealth Group later confirmed the breach affected approximately 100 million individuals — making it the largest healthcare

Carl B. Johnson Apr 23, 2026 5 min read
Strong Passwords

How to Create a Strong Password That Actually Works

In 2023, a single reused password gave a threat actor access to 23andMe's credential-stuffing attack that exposed the data of nearly 7 million users. The attacker didn't exploit a zero-day vulnerability or deploy sophisticated malware. They just tried stolen passwords from other breaches — and millions of

Carl B. Johnson Apr 23, 2026 5 min read
Spear Phishing vs Phishing

Spear Phishing vs Phishing: What Your Team Must Know

In 2023, a single spear phishing email cost MGM Resorts an estimated $100 million in losses. The attacker didn't blast a million inboxes with a generic "Your account has been suspended" message. They researched an employee on LinkedIn, called the IT help desk impersonating that person,

Carl B. Johnson Apr 22, 2026 5 min read