Barracuda Email Protection

Comprehensive, elegantly simple protection against email-borne threats to your users, brand, and business.

Between 75% and 90% of targeted cyber-attacks start with an email. Email-borne attacks interrupt business operations, cause financial damage, and compromise business integrity. Barracuda protects you by extending traditional email security with a multi-faceted approach that protects all aspects of your email infrastructure.

Learn more and request a free trial.

Phishing and Facebook – a test of reputation

October 16, 2018 by Asaf Cidon

Facebook is never far from the news agenda, so it was no surprise to see the company under the media spotlight again when it was revealed that a recent hack exposed the personal information of 30m users. After polling visitors to Cloud Expo earlier this year on their views of Facebook and data privacy, we took to the floor at the IP Expo show in London earlier this month to learn how businesses were feeling about their defences in the wake of the latest high profile attack.

The last time we spoke to the tech industry at a UK trade show, it was on the back of the news that millions of Facebook profiles were apparently exploited for political purposes, so we were keen to understand how views had changed in the six months since then.

Back in April, trust in Facebook appeared to have been badly affected, with 55% claiming that they trusted Facebook less as a result of the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Results from IP Expo further confirmed this, with 41% of respondents citing that they didn’t trust Facebook even before this latest news story. What’s encouraging is that individuals are taking measures to protect themselves – 28% said that they had amended their security and sharing settings as a result, almost identical to the 29% who said the same at Cloud Expo.

Individuals in the IT industry have definitely become more wary of how they’re using Facebook, but did this have any bearing on their business?

Asaf Cidon

Asaf Cidon is vice president of content security services at Barracuda Networks. In this role, he is one of the leaders for Barracuda Sentinel, the company's AI solution for real-time spear phishing and cyber fraud defense. Barracuda Sentinel utilizes artificial intelligence to learn the unique communications patterns inside customer organizations to identify anomalies and guard against these personalized attacks. Asaf was previously CEO and co-founder of Sookasa, a cloud storage security startup that was acquired by Barracuda. Prior to that, he completed his PhD at Stanford, where his research focused on cloud storage reliability and performance. He also worked at Google’s web search engineering team. Asaf holds a PhD and MS in Electrical Engineering from Stanford, and BSc in Computer Engineering from the Technion.

Connect with Asaf on LinkedIn.

http://www.barracuda.com

Most Cybersecurity Professionals Want to Quit but Often Don’t

October 12, 2018 by Mike Vizard

One could assume that given the chronic shortage of cybersecurity professionals that organizations large and small face there would be a maniacal focus on retaining individuals with these critical skills. But a survey of over 9,000 IT security professionals published this week by Mondo, a staffing agency, a full 60 percent of respondents reports they are looking to leave their job.

A lack of growth opportunities and job satisfaction are tied as the top reasons to leave a job, followed by unhealthy work environment, lack of IT security prioritization from C-level or upper management, unclear job expectations, and lack of mentorship.

Mike Vizard

Mike Vizard has covered IT for more than 25 years, and has edited or contributed to a number of tech publications including InfoWorld, eWeek, CRN, Baseline, ComputerWorld, TMCNet and Digital Review. He currently blogs for IT Business Edge and contributes to CIOinsight, The Channel Insider, Programmableweb and Slashdot. Mike also blogs about emerging cloud technology for SmarterMSP.

Connect with Mike on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelvizard

Homeland Security warning: Hackers targeting MSPs

October 4, 2018 by Anne Campbell

This week, the Department of Homeland Security issued a warning that advanced persistent threat (APT) actors are targeting managed service providers (MSPs) and cloud service providers (CSPs). IT service providers make attractive targets for cybercriminals due to the access they have to their customers’ networks and for the sensitive customer data that they may have stored on their own networks.

In the memo, The National Cybersecurity & Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) notes: “By servicing a large number of customers, IT service providers can achieve significant economies of scale. However, a compromise in one part of an IT service provider’s network can have globally cascading effects, impacting other customers and introducing significant risk.”

Advanced persistent threat (APT) actors are targeting Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and Cloud Service Providers (CSPs). @AnneKCampbell Click To Tweet

According to NCCIC, this activity by APT actors had been ongoing since at least 2016 using a variety of tactics. Research shows a spike in attacks targeting service providers in 2018. Trustwave, a managed security service provider, released a report in April showing that service providers now account for just over 9 percent of all the cyberattacks the firm tracks annually, up from nearly zero in 2017.

Anne Campbell

Anne Campbell is the public relations manager for Barracuda. She's been with the organization since 2014, working on content and public relations for Barracuda MSP, the MSP-dedicated business unit of Barracuda. She started her career in newspaper and magazine journalism, and she brings that editorial point of view the work she does, using it to help craft compelling stories.

https://blog.barracuda.com

Europol Highlights Continued Threats, but Magecart Demands Focus on Web Security

September 27, 2018 by Phil Muncaster

When it comes to the threat landscape it’s very easy to get distracted by the more eye-catching attacks. But while these might make for good headlines, and could even help some niche vendors to sell “silver bullet” solutions, there’s actually more continuity in terms of the cyber threats facing firms today than one might think. That fact is borne out by Europol’s latest annual Internet Organised Crime Threat Assessment (IOCTA) report. While there aren’t many surprises in there, it represents a sober assessment of the situation on the ground.

Europol’s IOCTA has one goal in mind: “to stop cyber-criminals from making you their next victim.” @philmuncaster discusses the report in this Barracuda blog post. Click To Tweet

If nothing else, it should be another prompt for organisations to ensure they have suitable measures in place to cope with ransomware, DDoS, phishing and the like. This should be complemented by web server and other controls to mitigate an emerging threat to e-commerce providers: digital skimming.

[Read more…] about Europol Highlights Continued Threats, but Magecart Demands Focus on Web Security

Phil Muncaster

Phil Muncaster is a technology writer and editor with over 12 years’ experience working on some of the biggest technology titles around, including Computing, The Register, V3 and MIT Technology Review. He spent over two years in Hong Kong immersed in the Asian tech scene and is now back in London where information security has become a major focus for his work.

Follow Phil on Twitter and connect with him on LinkedIn.

http://www.barracuda.com

Total Email Protection Bundle Now Available

September 20, 2018 by Ezra Hookano

We are pleased to announce that Barracuda’s Total Email Protection bundle is now available to partners worldwide. The bundle brings together our full email security portfolio — Barracuda Essentials, Barracuda Sentinel, and Barracuda PhishLine — in a single SKU, making it simpler for partners to provide their customers with a layered defense against email-borne threats. You can read the press release here.

When purchased together, Barracuda Essentials, Barracuda Sentinel, and Barracuda PhishLine offer a 360-degree view of email security by providing gateway security, data protection, AI-based targeted threat protection, and user awareness training.

The Total Email Protection bundle simplifies email security conversations, with both new and existing customers, by helping you tell one straightforward, compelling email security story instead of explaining individual solutions. Click To Tweet

Simplifying sales conversations

The Barracuda team developed this bundle in direct response to requests from our partners. We understand that you’re always looking for ways to simplify sales conversations and close deals faster, and this bundle helps make that possible. Combining these complementary services in a single SKU lowers deal friction, reduces administration, speeds up your sales cycle, and simplifies the purchase process for you as a channel partner.

Ezra Hookano

As VP, Channels at Barracuda Ezra is responsible for the direction of Barracuda's channel sales organization and its channel community. He has 25 years of indirect sales experience and a strong record of success growing channel organizations for multiple companies.

http://www.barracuda.com

UK organisations’ email accounts used in mass phishing campaigns

September 20, 2018 by Asaf Cidon

In recent months we have seen a significant rise in email account takeover attacks taking place in the UK.

Email account takeover may not be an attack that is regularly featured in media headlines, but it can be devastating for its victims and very hard to spot.

Barracuda Sentinel has been detecting a large number of phishing campaigns that use legitimate compromised accounts in the UK.Click To Tweet

How the attack works

Account takeover attacks involve criminals stealing the login credentials of an employee of an organization, remotely logging in to their account and launching attacks pretending to be them.

The attacks they launch are most commonly phishing campaigns that will often go undetected by security solutions as they appear to be genuine emails.

Over the last few weeks, we have specifically been seeing a large number of mass phishing campaigns that use legitimate compromised accounts from UK based organizations.

In this post, we survey some anonymized examples of these attacks.

Asaf Cidon

Connect with Asaf on LinkedIn.

http://www.barracuda.com

Threat Spotlight: Barracuda study finds account takeover incidents widespread, most commonly used for phishing campaigns

September 20, 2018 by Asaf Cidon

This Threat Spotlight was authored by Asaf Cidon with research support from Grant Ho of the Barracuda Sentinel team.

Account takeover incidents, where attackers steal the credentials of employees and use them to send emails from the user's real account, are increasing in frequency and magnitude. In this Threat Spotlight, we take a closer look at the motives and demographics behind these attacks.

In this Threat Spotlight, we examine Account Takeover attacks, where attackers attempt to steal user credentials in order to launch their own attacks from a legitimate but compromised business account. Click To Tweet

Highlighted Threat:

Account Takeover – attackers attempt to steal user credentials in order to launch attacks from an internal account.

The Details:

Account takeover (ATO) attacks have multiple objectives. Some attackers try to use the hacked email account to launch phishing campaigns that will go undetected, some attackers steal credentials of other employees and sell them in the black market, and others use the account to conduct reconnaissance to launch personalized attacks. The most sophisticated attackers steal the credentials of a key employee (e.g., CEO or CFO), and use them to launch a Business Email Compromise attack from the real employee's email address.

Asaf Cidon

Connect with Asaf on LinkedIn.

http://www.barracuda.com

Gaining ‘The Attacker Perspective’

September 10, 2018 by Dennis Dillman

It may seem counter-intuitive to place the motives and methods of attackers on a pedestal, but there is immense value in doing so. Today’s threat landscape demands an ongoing role reversal; which is the ability and desire to emulate the thought process and real-world methodologies of attackers in order to gain visibility and an advantage over the countless “what-if” scenarios that we face.

'The motives of an attacker will have a strong influence on the methods they employ to get what they want.' Click To Tweet

Visualizing what it is that an attacker wants is an important step because it provides us context into the motives portion of an attack. Many people still think that motives are purely financial or one-dimensional, but modern attacks are driven by a wide range of evolving motives. Let’s position our discussion around just a few of these:

Dennis Dillman

Dennis Dillman is VP of Product Management at Barracuda.

https://www.barracuda.com

Free webinar series – Comprehensive Security for K-12 – Reserve Your Place Now

September 10, 2018 by Jennifer Braun

Happy Back-to-School! Make sure your IT security and compliance investments are up to date and ready for this year’s trending threats. Join us for a pair of webinars and get the info you need to harden your school’s IT against the newest threats targeting K-12 organizations—using real-world case studies that show you just how your peers are creating safer, more enriching IT environments for enhanced learning.

Webinar #1: Network and Web Security for the 2018-19 School Year

Enjoy a deep dive into the emerging challenges you face around ensuring student safety and regulatory compliance—including advanced threats, escalating costs, and limited resources.

See for yourself how to:

Protect against advanced threats including ransomware
Enforce content policy on all devices including Chromebooks
Reserve bandwidth for critical applications such as testing apps
Secure data privacy for students, faculty, and staff

Date: September 18 at 11am PDT

Register here.

Jennifer Braun

http://www.barracuda.com

What WannaCry and NotPetya Revelations Mean for IT

September 7, 2018 by Mike Vizard

It’s fairly common for people to blame themselves whenever they experience some form of trauma that in reality occurred because of some set of circumstances well beyond their control. Organizations that fall prey to cybersecurity attacks are no different. There’s always a sense that someone somewhere inside that organization could have been done something different that would have resulted in a different outcome. In recent weeks, however, it’s become clear that two of the most virulent forms of malware to wreak havoc around the globe were the work of entities engaged in cyber-warfare.

Mike Vizard

Connect with Mike on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelvizard

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