Archive for September 15, 2023

Fortra’s Terranova Security and Microsoft Open Registration for Annual Gone Phishing Tournament

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 15, 2023 by itnerd

The fifth annual online Gone Phishing Tournament, hosted by Fortra’s Terranova Security and Microsoft between October 9-27, 2023, is open for registrations.  

The tournament, which uses real-world scenarios to establish accurate phishing clickthrough rates among end users, allows organizations to benchmark their phishing resilience against true global standards. Last year, 1.2 million users from across 250 organizations took part with over 21 phishing message languages deployed. 

The Gone Phishing Tournament assesses the limits of an organization’s security awareness, regardless of their size or industry. Participating organizations will receive a comprehensive report on the findings from the event, and recommendations for employees and security leaders alike – created by Fortra and Microsoft. 

The 2022 tournament, revealed several key findings:  

  • Overall clicks on phishing links improved on 2021 numbers, but many end users were still prone to following through on requests for sensitive information.  
  • Of those who clicked through, 44% completed action on the phishing website. 
  • Only organizations with 500 or fewer employees managed to keep their click-to-form completion rate under 30%, suggesting that if an organization of 10,000 employees had been targeted with a phishing scam, 700 would have clicked the link and 300 would have compromised sensitive information. 
  • The technology, finance, education, and public sectors boasted the highest number of participants. 
  • Of the not-for-profit organizations who took part, almost a third (33%) reported having no security awareness training in place. 

Potential participants can register through this link until September 30. 

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TikTok Gets Slapped By EU With with 345 Million Euro Fine Over Child Privacy Violations

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 15, 2023 by itnerd

TikTok’s problems have just grown massively. The Irish Data Protection Commission has fined TikTok €345 million for violating the privacy of children between the ages of 13 and 17 while processing their data. Details below:

TikTok didn’t like this decision as per this:

Responding to the decision, a TikTok spokesperson sent us this statement:

We respectfully disagree with the decision, particularly the level of the fine imposed. The DPC’s criticisms are focused on features and settings that were in place three years ago, and that we made changes to well before the investigation even began, such as setting all under 16 accounts to private by default.

TikTok also told us it is considering its next steps in light of the sanction. So the platform could seek to file a legal appeal in Ireland.

TikTok really needs to clean this stuff up as every time they get fined or called out for something like this, the trust level of TikTok which is is pretty low at the moment gets even lower. That’s not a good scenario for TikTok and it won’t end well for them.

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