With the outbreak of coronavirus, the world now has new problems to deal with, but the old issues haven’t gone anywhere. People are already facing troubles on an everyday basis, and now there are these hackers, scammers, and spammers that are increasing them. They are trying to steal away people’s data for ransom.
Social media apps promote several of these attacks. Yes, you heard me right; all these forwarded messages on WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, etc. are the chief source of transmission.
Coronavirus: Ways Of Attack
Most hackers aim to obtain your passwords and personal data for ransom. You’ll receive emails from these hackers with subject lines, “Coronavirus: Important information on precautions”. Once you click on such links, they will lead you to a webpage that would either ask for your passwords or would automatically download some malicious software on your device.
The malicious software (if downloaded), once it gets on your device, would lock you out of your device. And would a message such as: “Just because you’re home doesn’t mean you’re safe,” before demanding some ransom to unlock your files. Due to the coronavirus, most people have started working from their home on less secure networks. It makes them more vulnerable to such threats.
Coronavirus: How To Avoid Malware
Avoiding most of these risks means following the same old tested advice as observed during regular times. All these include: not clicking on these links, cross-checking the URLs you are visiting, allowing downloads only from trusted sources. These hackers often create URLs that similar to your login site.
Remote-Work Vulnerabilities
Due to the coronavirus outbreak, many MNCs have asked their employees to work from home, which has increased the chance of malware software to enter into the company’s mainframe. As most of the communication would happen over the internet, i.e. through emails and online video conferences. A hacker may easily hack the usual firewall on one’s device and blackmail the company.
Many users already report many such incidents. To make sure this doesn’t happen with you, you should follow the above-given advice.
