Malware delivered to email increased by 196% year over year in 2021, according to a new report. Further, unknown malware increased by a whopping 221%.
Interestingly, Business Email Compromise attacks declined by 10.61%, although profits remained sky-high, suggesting that hackers are getting more skilled at pilfering more money from fewer victims.
What does this mean for you? It means that relying on email security that only focuses myopically on social engineering attacks isn't enough. You need to be able to protect against ALL forms of email-borne cyberattacks. A full-fledged solution that includes malware protection is essential. Simply put, other API solutions don't have the ability to protect this fully.
Avanan can fully scan and block malware before it reaches the inbox. Others will actively deliver malware to the inbox while doing the analysis in the background. Even if the analysis takes a few moments, the malware is still in the environment. The solutions will only provide a warning banner, saying that the attachment is being analyzed. Some solutions don't even do that.
This is because they cannot block prior to the inbox. They also can't do Content Disarm & Reconstruction, which strips all executable content from a file and delivers it to the inbox, without any threats and any delay to user productivity. This process prevented the recent Follina vulnerability in Microsoft from reaching inboxes. Other APIs can't say the same.
The numbers back this up. Late last year, Check Point did an analysis of how different vendors fare against known and unknown malware. Check Point's malware capabilities were far and away better.
We broke it down even further:
Here's the thing: When deploying email security, that product needs to protect against everything related to email security. If you can't stop malware, end-users won't be protected.