Like most small business owners, I did all of the SEO
things one does when they have a new business website up and get noticed by
search engines and clients.
I set up my descriptions, keywords, signed up for Google My Business,
and created a profile on Manta. With my
website up for only 1 day, per Google Analytics I got my first visitor. Can you guess from where? You guessed it, Russia. Not really part of my geographic profile, but
what the heck, a website visitor, is a website visitor. The individual had spent about a minute on
each of my pages. That’s great, I’m
getting noticed the first day my website is up.
And then on day 2, it happened. I had an e-mail in my Spam folder. I looked at the subject line, and sure
enough, it was a phishing e-mail. The e-mail
was in the name of an individual and the subject line read “Your Monthly
Statement document is ready for review” Keep in mind, my website had been up for only
2 days. My website and the listing
websites were the only places my newly created company e-mail was posted. And when I hovered my cursor above the
displayed e-mail address, yes you guessed it, it had a .ru domain.
A week later I got my first spear phishing attempt. This e-mail was also displaying the name of
an individual and the subject line read; “Please DocuSign: Order Form for
tjmprofessional.com” and the body stated; “ accounting@tjmprofessional.com has sent you
a document to review and sign. “.
Ironically, I don’t have a separate generic e-mail address called
“accounting”. But to give credit to the
hacker, it did look more enticing and believable. And yes, again the e-mail had a Russian
domain.
So if you are wondering if your a 6 month old startup, or
your 50 year old family business is at risk for a cyber attack?
The answer is most definitely "Yes!".
My business was found, researched, and attacked within 2 days of its
online existence.
Now if only my clients could develop these hacker skills, and
find my website as easily. Who would
need to pay for Google AdWords? J
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