NAIROBI, Kenya, Sep 29 – Cyberattacks in the Kenyan financial sector continued to grow significantly in the second quarter of 2022 as scammers increasingly become corporate-oriented, shifting from other sectors, a new report shows.
According to Kaspersky’s Financial Cyberthreats Q2 report, financial phishing attacks detected n the country rose by 201 per cent to 100, 192 in the period compared to Q1.
Financial phishing is a type of online fraud where the scammer sends fake alerts from banks, e-pay systems and other organisations to trick consumers into sharing their financial details.
The alerts sent by the scammer can be related to loss of data, update credentials, or system breakdown, which results in theft of passwords, credit card numbers, bank account details, and other confidential information.
The report shows that the largest share of attacks was directed at e-commerce websites (58 per cent), with banks (21 per cent) and payment systems (also 21 per cent) following.
“A life without Internet is strange to us. So much so that our financial life is now digital. This is the magic of digitisation. But we also need to be aware of an unprecedented wave of challenges. Financial threats are one such challenge which is becoming more advanced in exploiting human behaviour and will only continue to grow,” said Emad Haffar, Head of Technical Experts at Kaspersky.
Haffar called on businesses trying to stay ahead of such cyberattacks to make fraud prevention a focal point, to control fraud transactions which will eventually reduce fraud risk in the future and avoid reputation damage.
To help businesses stay ahead of financial threats and phishing attacks, Kaspersky recommended the companies to educate employees one red flags they need to keep an eye out for.
The cybersecurity firm also urged the firms to extend the dos and don’ts of cybersecurity to their customers to help them protect themselves against falling victim to phishing fraud.