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CEO Fraud

CEO Fraud Email Scam: How Attackers Steal Millions

A Single Email Cost This Company $47 Million In 2015, Ubiquiti Networks disclosed that attackers impersonating company executives tricked finance employees into wiring $46.7 million to overseas accounts controlled by threat actors. No malware. No zero-day exploit. Just a carefully crafted CEO fraud email scam that exploited trust, urgency,

Carl B. Johnson Sep 07, 2020 7 min read
Executive Phishing Attacks

Executive Phishing Attacks: Why the C-Suite Is Target #1

The CEO Who Wired $47 Million to a Threat Actor In 2016, Austrian aerospace manufacturer FACC fired its CEO after the company lost €42 million (roughly $47 million) in a business email compromise attack. A threat actor impersonated the CEO via email and convinced a finance employee to wire funds

Carl B. Johnson Sep 07, 2020 6 min read
Supply Chain Attacks

Supply Chain Attack Examples That Changed Cybersecurity

In December 2020, security firm FireEye discovered that a routine software update from SolarWinds had been weaponized to infiltrate roughly 18,000 organizations — including the U.S. Treasury, the Department of Homeland Security, and multiple Fortune 500 companies. The attackers didn't kick down the front door. They walked

Carl B. Johnson Sep 07, 2020 7 min read
Third Party Risk Management

Third Party Vendor Cybersecurity Risk: A Practical Guide

In 2023, a single compromised file transfer tool — MOVEit — cascaded into breaches affecting over 2,600 organizations and roughly 90 million individuals. The threat actor, the Cl0p ransomware group, didn't need to hack each victim directly. They exploited one vendor, and the dominoes fell. That's third

Carl B. Johnson Jul 27, 2020 7 min read
Vendor Risk Management

Vendor Risk Management Cybersecurity: A Practical Guide

The Breach That Didn't Start With You In 2023, the MOVEit Transfer vulnerability didn't just hit Progress Software. It cascaded through thousands of organizations — government agencies, banks, healthcare systems — because those organizations trusted a single vendor's file transfer tool. Over 2,600 organizations and

Carl B. Johnson Jul 19, 2020 8 min read
Cybersecurity Due Diligence

Cybersecurity Due Diligence: What Most Companies Miss

The $350 Million Wake-Up Call Nobody Expected When Verizon acquired Yahoo in 2017, a previously undisclosed breach affecting 3 billion accounts forced the deal price down by $350 million. That single failure of cybersecurity due diligence became the most expensive cautionary tale in M&A history — and it permanently

Carl B. Johnson Jun 25, 2020 7 min read
Dark Web Monitoring

Dark Web Monitoring for Businesses: A Practical Guide

Your Employees' Passwords Are Already for Sale In March 2024, a single dark web marketplace listed over 10 billion stolen credentials. That's not a typo. The Verizon 2024 Data Breach Investigations Report found that stolen credentials were involved in roughly 31% of all breaches over the past

Carl B. Johnson Jun 25, 2020 8 min read
Dark Web

What Is the Dark Web? A Security Pro's Real Guide

Your Stolen Password Is Probably Already There In 2024, a single dark web marketplace called BreachForums was seized by the FBI — and then resurrected by its users within two weeks. That tells you everything about the persistence of the underground economy. If you've ever wondered what is the

Carl B. Johnson Jun 25, 2020 6 min read
Stolen Credentials Dark Web

Stolen Credentials Dark Web: How Your Logins End Up for Sale

In May 2024, the FBI and international partners seized BreachForums — one of the largest marketplaces where stolen credentials on the dark web were bought and sold in bulk. The forum had facilitated the sale of billions of compromised records, including credentials tied to U.S. government agencies, healthcare organizations, and

Carl B. Johnson Jun 25, 2020 7 min read