Unfortunately, cybercriminals are taking advantage of this situation to trick people out of their money in these difficult times. According to a study by cybersecurity company Check Point, attackers are targeting people through stimulus-themed websites and emails for stealing data and money. [Read: An entrepreneur’s guide to long-term marketing strategies amid COVID-19] In one of the cases studied by the firm, attackers sent emails to people to steal usernames and passwords through fake login forms. From the beginning of the last month, 4,305 stimulus-related domains have been registered. Out of those, 56 were malicious and 656 were suspicious. Check Point’s Data Team Leader, Omer Dembinsky, said people should only use authorized government websites to avail financial benefits: The security company also noted that in the past week, coronavirus related attacks have shot up from 14,000 attacks a day on average in March, to 20,000 attacks per day. It added that a whopping 94% of attacks in the past two weeks have been phishing. The news from Check Point is yet another indicator that cybercriminals will stoop to new lows to target vulnerable people during a pandemic. Last week, Google said that it blocked 18 million malicious emails and 240 million spam emails with a coronavirus angle every day.
