Cybercrime is Worse Than You Think

Cybercrime is often thought of as a loner’s game. There is this misconception that all hacks are carried out by hoodie-clad people in dark corners of a room. Nothing could be further from the truth. Today, we will take a brief look at organized cybercrime and why its growth is an ominous sign for businesses.

Explaining Cybercrime

Cybercrime are hacks and scams perpetrated over the Internet. There are literally thousands of ways for hackers to access security-protected networks, but the most prevalent is phishing. Funny enough, with cybercrime rising every year, the main way hackers gain the access they need to cause havoc is by scamming people into doing the heavy lifting for them. These phishing attacks come from every direction: over the phone, through email and social media platforms, and even through the mail.

This doesn’t happen by accident.

The truth is that today there are businesses that provide data theft and malware deployment services. It may seem strange that there are enterprise-level companies that specialize in hacking who have a supply chain, but that is the reality.  International companies with people developing code in one place, marketing and operations in another, and call centers in multiple locations. When you consider that is what you are facing, and not some lone hacker, it starts to get pretty intimidating. 

Organized Cybercrime

What do these organizations look like in real life? A lot like your business. Seriously. A business sets up a bunch of phony websites designed to steal personal information. In order to do this they need a workforce. 

People sit in an office (or presumably work remotely) to build this nefarious environment. They have a creative team that designs the scamming websites, emails, and messages to make them look legitimate. Marketers promote the phony sites just as your marketing team promotes your business. They have backend analytic teams that determine which lures tend to work the best and share that knowledge with the web and application developers, creative teams, and management. They have a team of data support professionals that sift through stolen data. They have a finance department that is in charge of laundering the revenue and pays workers as your finance department handles your business’ finances. Finally, they have management, whose job is to keep operations running effectively and keep off the radar of the dozens of international law enforcement agencies actively combating this activity. 

All in all, the best of them are well-run, well-organized criminal organizations that operate much like any business would. What’s worse, the more sophisticated these organizations are, the less visible they are, as their success can help them afford to keep their activities anonymous through front companies and laundered money.

At SCW, we can help your organization by deploying state-of-the-art security tools, promote best practices, and help set up real world training strategies. If you would like to talk about how to keep these large international hacking organizations from being a major problem for your business, give us a call today at (509) 534-1530.