How sensitive should you be to phishing?
Internet connection has made our lives easier, yet it brings as many merits as dangers – phishing being one of them. Do you think you are phishing-proof? Well, think again.
What is phishing?
For those of you who found yourselves asking what phishing is – it is a practice of criminals pretending to be from a well-known and trusted company or institution with an aim to gather your personal data, like passwords in order to commit identity crimes.
What are the facts about phishing?
Diligent has conducted a survey in 2016 to investigate people’s sensitivity to phishing and the results are as follows:
Out of 2000 respondents, 52% have fallen victims to phishing in the past and unfortunately noted an unauthorised charge on their credit card, whereas 33% had their e-mail accounts hacked. We can assume that the reasons behind these scams are unsafe links or messages claiming the victim won a prize.
Yet, it is not that easy to trick us now. Apparently, over the years of Nigerian prince scams and Google Docs attacks, we grew to be more alert. Throughout the years, we have grown to become more alert to phishing scams as a result of their frequency and an increased media coverage. Only 9% of the people surveyed recently responded to e-mails claiming they had won prizes.
However, what still seems to trip us are the e-mails with Dropbox or text files, new friends’ photo alerts, etc.
Recently, there has been a huge scandal concerning DHL e-mails. Scammers were sending messages concerning shipping of parcels even to people who weren’t anticipating any deliveries. Clicking on embedded links led to the installation of malware.
Diligent observed that people between 45 and 50 years of age are the most alert to scams, whereas either the youngest (18-24–year-olds) or the oldest (65-year-olds and older) are the worst at spotting dangerous e-mails.
What is more, gender doesn’t matter, since women get tricked 23,3% of the time and men 23% of the time, according to Diligent’s research.
It’s safe to say that we’ve learnt to be more aware of the frauds around us. However, in no time, new techniques will start to haunt us. If you wish to check your vulnerability to phishing, you can test your skills on Diligent website. Good luck and stay safe!
