ATTACK OF THE THIEVING PHISHERS: AT&T MOST IMPERSONATED BRAND, SAYS CLOUDFLARE

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 (Bernama) -- Cloudflare Inc has revealed that AT&T ranked first among the most impersonated brands in phishing attempts in 2022, according to its global report on the Top 50 Brands Used in Phishing Attacks.

PayPal earned the second spot followed by Microsoft (third), DHL (fourth) and Facebook (Meta) (fifth) on the list of most impersonated brands in phishing attacks published by the security, performance and reliability company helping to build a better Internet.

In a statement, Cloudflare said almost 20 per cent of all websites are protected by its global network and its email security offering stopped 2.3 billion unwanted emails from hitting inboxes in 2022.

As a result, Cloudflare’s machine learning and data analysis give it unique insight into the phishing domains most frequently clicked on by Internet users and the ability to proactively protect its Zero Trust customers.

“Phishing attacks prey on our trust in the brands we love and use everyday, and are becoming more difficult to spot for even the most digitally-savvy person.

“Our sanity, bank accounts, and passwords should not be compromised because we glossed over a misspelled 'from' field or accidentally clicked on an obscure URL,” said Cloudflare co-founder and chief executive officer, Matthew Prince.

“Phishing” refers to an attempt to steal sensitive information like usernames, passwords, credit card numbers, bank and crypto account information, or other important data in order to utilise or sell the stolen information.

Cloudflare found that finance, technology, and telecom brands were the most commonly impersonated industries, notably for the unprecedented access and financial benefit that bank accounts, email and social media, and phone companies can give attackers.

Technology and telecom companies are a unique threat because phishing attacks can intercept the emails and text messages that are used to verify a user’s identity via two-factor authentication.

Cloudflare also announced new capabilities to provide customers the most comprehensive and effective phishing protection available. Building on Cloudflare Area1’s recent launch of advanced Zero Trust email security tools, customers can now automatically and immediately identify and block “confusable” domains to better protect their corporate networks.

-- BERNAMA