As a system administrator for a medium-sized corporation, you notice an unusual email being circulated within the company. The email in question appears to be from the CEO requesting urgent wire transfers to a new vendor due to an alleged internal system audit. What immediate action should you take to mitigate the risks?
Reply to the email asking for more details about the vendor and the audit.
Comply with the email directives and perform the wire transfer to the new vendor.
Forward the email to other department heads to quickly fulfill the CEO's request.
Verify the request via a direct phone call to the CEO and alert the IT security team.
This type of scenario is indicative of a Business Email Compromise (BEC) attack where an attacker impersonates a high-level executive to deceive company employees into transferring funds or revealing sensitive information. The immediate action should involve verifying the request's authenticity directly with the CEO through a known, separate communication channel (like a direct phone call), and not via a reply to the suspicious email. It's important to educate users that legitimate requests for transferring funds are not normally processed through email directives without standard verification processes.
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What is a Business Email Compromise (BEC) attack?
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