Email security appears grounded as attacks continue to take flight

Recently inboxes have been hit by the so-called “airline phishing attack.” It is a new take on an old phishing email. It uses multiple techniques to capture sensitive data and deploy an advanced persistent threat (APT).

Barracuda Networks has seen this attack with several of its customers, especially in industries that deal with frequent shipping of goods or employee travel, such as logistics, shipping, and manufacturing. The attacker will either impersonate a travel agency or even an employee in HR or finance who is sending an airline ticket or e-ticket. The email will be constructed to appear inconspicuous.

The attacker will have researched his target, selecting the airline, destination and price so that these details look legitimate in the context of the company and the recipient, Barracuda reports. After getting the employee to open the email, an APT embedded in an email attachment goes into action. The attachment is typically formatted as a PDF or DOCX document. In this attack, the malware will be executed upon opening the document. 

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