CyberCX Hack Report: Insights from a year of offensive security testing

The Hunted Cyber team’s tips for staying safe from scams

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Published by CyberCX on 11 August 2023

 

If you own a smartphone or use the internet, it is all but guaranteed that you have encountered a scam. It could be a phone call claiming to be from your bank that doesn’t feel right, or an email seeming to be from a friend, asking you to click on a dodgy looking link.

Unfortunately, technology-enabled scams have become far too normalised and prevalent in the digital age, as scammers continually innovate and find new ways of targeting innocent end users at scale.

In fact, two-thirds of Australians aged over 15 years or older were exposed to scams last year.[1] With the number of reported data breaches in Australia also continuing to rise – a 26 per cent increase in the second half of last year[2] – knowing how to protect yourself from scams has never been more important.

Simply put, every data breach that sees personal information dumped onto the dark web means that savvy scammers have more material to work with when it comes to impersonating your bank, telco, family, or friends.

Fortunately, there are some steps you can take to minimise your risk of being scammed. Fresh from their work tracking and tracing Fugitives across Victoria in season two of Network Ten’s record-breaking program Hunted Australia, we asked members of the Hunted Cyber team, Jason, Vikki, Jay, and Carter for their top tips to stay safe from scams online.

 

The Cyber team at Hunted HQ in Melbourne

 

Drawing on their formidable skills and knowledge across ethical hacking, digital forensics and open-source intelligence, here’s what these CyberCX experts had to say:

 

CyberCX’s Jason Edelstein and Carter Smith in action at Hunted HQ

 

For more information on scams and staying safe online, check out these helpful resources:

 

You can also catch Jason, Vikki, Jay, and Carter demonstrating their expertise on the Hunters Cyber team in Hunted Australia season two on Ten Play here: https://10play.com.au/hunted

 

Authors: Jason Edelstein, Vikki Grouios, Carter Smith, Jay Banerji

 


[1] Australian Bureau of Statistics – 13.2 million Australians exposed to scams – February 2023

[2] Office of the Australian Information Commissioner – Notifiable Data Breaches Report: July to December 2022

[3] Office of the Australian Information Commissioner – Notifiable Data Breaches Report: July to December 2022

[4] National Anti-Scam Centre – Scamwatch: Scam statistics

 


 

We are hiring! CyberCX currently have open offensive roles in penetration testing, adversary simulation, and AppSec for Australia and New Zealand. If you are interested in working with the largest and most capable team in the region in a fun, rewarding, and challenging environment, please send your CV to [email protected]

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