News | February 11, 2021

Barracuda Email Threat Scanner Detects Millions Of Attacks Missed By Organizations' Existing Protection

New and improved tool delivers enhanced reporting and redesigned user experience

Highlights:

  • In 2020, 4,550 organizations used Barracuda Email Threat Scanner to scan 2,600,531 unique mailboxes and found 2,029,413 unique attacks.
  • On average, 512 attacks were found per organization.
  • 14% of all mailboxes had at least one email attack detected.
  • 59% of the threats detected were phishing scams.

Barracuda, a trusted partner and leading provider of cloud-enabled security solutions, today announced a redesigned version of the Barracuda Email Threat Scanner, a free tool that helps businesses detect email threats that got past their email gateway. These threats include highly targeted attacks such as spear phishing, business email compromise, conversation hijacking and services impersonation, among many others.

Each scan provides a report on attacks found inside the environment, as well as at-risk domains and employees. This helps organizations identify gaps in existing email protection and assess email security vulnerabilities.

The refreshed Barracuda Email Threat Scanner brings a complete user interface update to the scanner’s dashboard. This includes:

  • A scan preview page, which allows users to monitor their scan’s progress while the scan is running.
  • Access to early results as Email Threat Scanner scans mailboxes and finds attacks.
  • Improved dashboard reporting of detected threats, making it easier to hone in on specific insights and interpret the findings.
  • A 14-day free trial of Barracuda Sentinel can now be launched directly from the scanner, giving customers a chance to experience the benefits of ongoing protection.

In 2020, 4,550 organizations used Barracuda Email Threat Scanner to scan 2,600,531 unique mailboxes and found 2,029,413 unique attacks. On average, 512 attacks were found per organization, and one out of 7 mailboxes (14%) had at least one attack currently sitting inside, even if messages were scanned by an email gateway solution.

The attacks detected fall into four email threat types: phishing, scamming, extortion, and business email compromise (BEC). Of the 2,029,413 unique attacks detected, phishing was the number one threat missed by the organizations’ email security solutions (59%). Scamming was the second most common (39%). Extortion (9%) and BEC (8%) were less prevalent, but cybercriminals tend to send these types of attacks in smaller volumes because they are highly personalized.

“Spear phishing threats are more dangerous than ever due to the sophistication of attackers, and while organizations have invested in protection against email threats, many of these attacks slip through gateways, landing in users’ inboxes,” said Don MacLennan, SVP, Engineering & Product Management, Email Protection, Barracuda, Barracuda. “As these numbers show, traditional email gateways are not enough. Customers should also use API-based inbox defenses to maximize their protection.”

Barracuda Sentinel integrates directly into Office 365 to find threats inside your mail system that security gateways can’t see. For more information, visit https://www.barracuda.com/products/sentinel.

What service providers are saying:
“It's critical to help our customers assess and understand email security vulnerabilities. The Barracuda Email Threat Scanner helps us quickly and effectively find social engineering attacks that might be going undetected in mailboxes and help close the gaps in those areas for our customers. The Email Threat Scanner makes the ‘invisible’ security threats visible, so that our customers see what they are up against and act to put a Barracuda solution in place quickly.”  — Chris Riley, Director, System Source

“Many email threats slip past the email gateway. Threats like spear phishing and business email compromise put companies at significant risk. Barracuda Email Threat Scanner detects these threats and helps us uncover additional ways we can help customers protect their people and data.” — Kristian Connor, Director, Xitenys

“Using Barracuda Email Threat Scanner we’ve helped our customers uncover serious threats hiding in their Office 365 environment in a fast, free, and safe way. Not only does this make our customers more secure, but it helps us show the value of the solutions we offer them.” — Troy Radloff, General Manager, Alliance Business Tech

Resources:

Source: Barracuda