Tag

Business Email Compromise

Analyzes business email compromise (BEC) scams where attackers impersonate executives or vendors to trick employees into transferring funds or sharing sensitive data. Covers detection methods, employee training approaches, and technical controls to prevent BEC attacks.

posts

Whaling Attack

Whaling Attack Cybersecurity: How CEOs Get Hooked

In 2016, an employee at Austrian aerospace firm FACC wired $47 million to a bank account controlled by criminals — because an email that looked like it came from the CEO told them to. The CEO was fired. The CFO was fired. The company's stock tanked. That single email

Carl B. Johnson Apr 22, 2022 7 min read
CEO Fraud Email Scam

CEO Fraud Email Scam: How to Stop It Cold

In March 2021, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that business email compromise — the category that includes every CEO fraud email scam — generated $1.8 billion in reported losses in 2020 alone. That made it the single most financially damaging cybercrime category in the entire IC3 report,

Carl B. Johnson Oct 01, 2021 7 min read
Fake Email

Fake Email: How to Spot, Stop, and Survive One

A Single Fake Email Cost Facebook and Google $120 Million Between 2013 and 2015, a Lithuanian man named Evaldas Rimasauskas sent a series of fake email messages to employees at Facebook and Google. He impersonated a legitimate hardware vendor, complete with forged invoices and contracts. By the time both companies

Carl B. Johnson Aug 31, 2021 7 min read
Spoofing

Spoof Attacks: How Threat Actors Impersonate You

In July 2021, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that business email compromise — overwhelmingly powered by spoof techniques — cost victims over $1.8 billion in 2020 alone. That made it the single most financially damaging category of cybercrime they tracked. Not ransomware. Not credential theft. Spoofing-driven impersonation.

Carl B. Johnson Aug 24, 2021 8 min read
Gmail Phishing Attacks

Gmail Sophisticated Attacks: FBI Phishing Warnings in 2021

In March 2021, Google disclosed that it blocks more than 100 million phishing emails daily — and Gmail remains the single largest target for sophisticated credential theft campaigns worldwide. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) reported that phishing was the number one crime type by victim count in

Carl B. Johnson Aug 24, 2021 7 min read
Fake Emails

Fake Emails: How to Spot Them Before They Cost You

In March 2021, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that Business Email Compromise — the sophisticated cousin of fake emails — caused over $1.8 billion in losses during 2020 alone. That made it the costliest category of cybercrime they tracked. Not ransomware. Not credit card fraud. Fake emails

Carl B. Johnson Aug 15, 2021 7 min read
FakeEmail

FakeEmail Attacks: How Spoofed Messages Breach Networks

The FakeEmail That Cost One Company $75 Million In 2020, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that business email compromise — attacks built on fakeemail techniques — generated over $1.8 billion in losses in a single year. That made it the costliest category of cybercrime, beating ransomware by

Carl B. Johnson Aug 15, 2021 7 min read
PayPal DocuSign Phishing

PayPal DocuSign Phishing: How to Spot This Attack

Last month, a finance manager at a mid-sized logistics company received what looked like a routine DocuSign envelope — a payment authorization supposedly routed through PayPal. She clicked, entered her PayPal credentials on a pixel-perfect fake login page, and within 90 minutes, the attacker had initiated $38,000 in wire transfers.

Carl B. Johnson Jul 29, 2021 7 min read
Fake Mailer

Fake Mailer Attacks: How Threat Actors Spoof Emails

In March 2021, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that business email compromise — often launched using a fake mailer or spoofing tool — cost American organizations over $1.8 billion in 2020 alone. That made it the most financially damaging cybercrime category in the entire IC3 report, dwarfing

Carl B. Johnson Jul 01, 2021 7 min read