Criminal hackers are sold on the value of email and social media, and they’re adapting their use of those channels to maintain the impact of their attacks. A new Report indicates how powerful those adaptions are and just how important communication channels remain to criminals.

“Protecting People: A Quarterly Analysis of Highly Targeted Cyber Attacks” is a new report from Proofpoint that draws on the company’s captured and analyzed traffic to draw conclusions about the current targets and tactics of cyber criminals. One of the findings is that criminals are continually changing targets within an organization; 99% of the most targeted email addresses weren’t ranked at all in the last report.

n order to avoid triggering traditional spam filters and anti-malware software, URL-based attacks now far outnumber those based on malicious attachments. The URL frequently comes in an email message designed to appear critical, with “request,” “urgent,” and “payment” appearing in the subject lines of 58% of all email scams, according to the report.

At the same time that email attacks are on the rise, social media channels are also increasingly used as attack vectors against companies and organizations.

Read more: Dark Reading 

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