In this latest installment of IT Europa Business Insights, IT Europa’s Editor, Carl Friedmann sat with Cofense’s VP of sales for Cofense Protect and co-founder of Cyberfish, Amit Israel to discuss his experience in the Israeli security and intelligence industry, cyber-intelligence and counterterrorism initiatives, and how it has dovetailed into his role at Cofense, to confront and stamp out attacks.
Getting more adept in tackling phishing attacks is becoming a greater priority as 2022 gathers pace, especially considering how prolific they were in 2021 in their size and scope. According to Cisco's 2021 Cybersecurity Threat Trends report, for instance, phishing attacks are responsible for more than 80% of reported security incidents, and about 90% of data breaches occur because of phishing.
It’s due to this urgency to act that cloud-native phishing detection and response company Cofense has amassed a global network of 30 million people through advanced AI-based automation to quickly stop phishing threats.
Before joining Cofense, Amit spearheaded a unit that was coping with cyberattacks against the state of Israel in both the private and government sectors. “What I saw was that nearly everyone who was attacking was using phishing,” he says. “What was most surprising was no one could cope with it even though there were dozens of solutions out there. I was determined to put an end to that.”
The main principle for a company is know the enemy, and to be better, faster and smarter in order to detect and avoid attacks.
Another fundamental issue Amit discusses that needs to be addressed is that even though 90% of cyberattacks today begin with phishing, most companies invest more than 90% in other threats. “They spend most of their security budget in the other 10% of attacks, and only 5% of it in the area where 90% of the threats come from,” adds Amit. “This should change and it’s the MSPs that are leading in this change.”
For more detail about Cofense and phishing prevention in the latest IT Europa Business Insights discussion, please click here.
