The volume of cyber attacks trying to exploit home workers has risen sharply during lockdown, increasing the focus on taking a zero-trust approach.
If nothing is trusted, that should enable customers to start from a fairly aggressive security posture and give vulnerable remote workers increased protection.
Security distribution specialist e92plus has signed Ericom to ensure that it can add more zero-trust protection to the services resellers pitch customers. The vendor’s product focuses on making web browsing safer, with web activity isolated on secured containers preventing any malicious code from being downloaded directly onto a user’s device.
Under the terms of the agreement, the distributor will provide supporting services for partners, including free digital and social marketing platforms, extensive technical services for pre-sales consultancy, health checks and deployments. Project financing will also be available to give upfront margin.
“Zero trust is an approach many organisations are looking to embrace, especially with more remote users than ever accessing corporate applications, networks and the web,” said Mukesh Gupta, chief executive and founder of e92plus.
“In the current climate, our focus is on helping our partners support their customers with innovative technologies that do not just provide the most advanced cyber security protection, but also fundamentally help their businesses at the most challenging time,” he added.
“Our focus is on helping our partners support their customers with innovative technologies that provide the most advanced cyber security protection and fundamentally help their businesses at the most challenging time”
Mukesh Gupta, e92plus
In response, David Canellos, Ericom president and CEO, said it had wanted to work with a distributor that had a track record of supporting partners and growing business.
“This alliance ensures that our partners and mutual customers experience the full value of our cyber security solutions,” he said.
Potential victims are sent a text pretending to be from HMRC telling them they need to share personal and financial information on a website that is a replica of a gov.uk site to get a tax rebate.
“Phishing attacks remain a big problem. Many are designed to be effective in these environments by targeting large numbers of people with Covid-19-related claims. These attacks use tailored techniques, dynamic websites, and regularly update the methods used. The result is a series of attacks that have an alarmingly high success rate, yet a relatively low detection rate,” said Kevin Curran, IEEE member and professor of cyber security at Ulster University.
That warning came in the wake of research from IT disposal company DSA Connect, which found that 26% of people claimed to have seen an increase in online scams and phishing attacks since they started working from home.
“We are seeing the perfect storm for a dramatic increase in data breaches. Since the coronavirus crisis started, there has been a huge increase in phishing websites, workforces have become depleted, employees working from home are more susceptible to cyber attacks, and our research suggests they now have greater access to even more confidential data,” said Harry Benham, chairman of DSA Connect.
