Nearly half of Filipino Internet users were found to be at risk of falling prey to cybercriminals due to lapses and other harmful online habits that could make them highly vulnerable to attacks.
This was based on the results of a survey conducted by global cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab, which polled 18,000 Internet users from 16 countries, including 1,394 from the Philippines. Respondents, who were all more than 18 years old, answered questions which determined their online habits and cyberthreat awareness.
Of the 1,394 respondents from the Philippines, 49.4 percent of internet users were found to be keeping applications that have been left unused for a long time. The Philippines ranked the worst in this category among the 16 countries included in the survey. The global average was 37 percent.
This seemingly harmless mistake could actually serve as an accessible entry for cybercriminals looking for prey, according to one of Kaspersky Lab’s security experts.
“Keeping unused applications on their devices is a common mistake for Filipinos. It is a dire error to leave apps with old software stocked on your devices because these applications have outdated programs, which may become a widely open door that cybercriminals can exploit easily. These old apps can be used to turn your beloved devices against you,” explained Anthony Chua, territory channel manager for the Philippines and Singapore at Kaspersky Lab Southeast Asia.
The online survey also asked respondents to select what they would do if they received an
e-mail from the “tax office” with the attached Word document “Information about your unpaid fines.”
Such frightening or arresting e-mails often contained malware masked under common harmless formats like the text format. This technique of sending e-mails carrying infected word attachments was used by a Trojan named Locky, a ransomware discovered by Kaspersky Lab just last February, which was still actively propagating in 114 countries worldwide, including the Philippines.