Holiday Cybersecurity Threats

The holiday season has begun.

While some eat are eating turkey or cookies, watch football or holiday movies, and browse emails from brands or details of shipping information, cyber threats don’t take a seat on the couch. In fact, past statistics tell us that attempted cyber attacks increase during the holiday season.

All types of organization’s throughout every industry and sector have to account for the holidays and face staffing issues, which leads to distractions and potentially decreases overall vigilance. Cyber threat actors are aware of this, which is exactly why attempted attacks increase this time of year.

CISCO’s 2021 Cybersecurity Threat Report showed that phishing attacks historically spike at the holidays, with a peak of a 52% increase during the holiday season.

Darktrace also found in 2021 that there was a 70% increase in attempted ransomware attacks in November and December compared to January and February.

So now that you know that attempted cyber attacks increase this time of year, what can you do if you know your organization is likely to be understaffed in multiple departments, including IT or security?

• Have an incident response plan and team in place ready to act if a threat happens
  • Watch our on-demand webinar on Cyber Incident Response Planning and Training to learn more
  • Employ third-party monitoring services that work 24/7/365 to cover where you have gaps
• Provide cyber awareness training for all staff members
  • Phishing scams are still the most prevalent form of attacks to gain access to a network
  • Understaffed organizations may be more likely to fall victim to phishing attacks during this time of year
  • Always follow the 3-second rule before clicking on anything and never click on any attachment you weren’t expecting

Vigilance and awareness are the first steps to securing your network. Remember that accidents do happen and reporting them immediately before an incident escalates is critical in order to minimize the damage, as is giving your staff grace so they feel comfortable reporting incidents quickly.

Year round cyber vigilance can be exhausting and cause burnout, but keeping your guard up during the holidays is always important.

Learn more about cyber awareness training for your staff and have a cyber safe holiday season!