Microsoft Knocked Out Of No. 1 Spot As Most Impersonated Brand In Phishing Emails

Crédit Agricole has knocked Microsoft out of the top slot for the first time as the brand most exploited by phishing artists. But it is a dubious distinction, according to the Phishers’ Favorites report from Vade. 

In Q2, Crédit Agricole phishing URLs rose by 296%. And for another financial institution, La Banque Postale URLs increased 831 percent — jumping 18 spots to become #5 on the list. 

Microsoft, after four straight quarters as #1, fell to third on the list for the first half of the year.

But the brand can take little comfort: sophisticated phishing artists utilized logo and background images to automatically display Microsoft corporate branding on fraudulent Microsoft 365 login pages. 

Facebook held steady as number two. 

Here is the top 25 based on unique phishing URLs:

  1. Crédit Agricole — 17,755
  2. Facebook — 17,338
  3. Microsoft — 12,777
  4. WhatsApp — 8,727
  5. La Banque Postale — 7,180
  6. Orange — 4,047
  7. Amazon — 3,501
  8. Comcast — 3,116
  9. PayPal — 2,601
  10. Chase — 2,537
  11. DHL — 2,375
  12. Rakuten — 1,966
  13. Netflix — 1,946
  14. Adobe — 1,581
  15. Well’s Fargo — 1,564
  16. Yahoo — 1,510
  17. Instagram — 1,098
  18. LinkedIn — 967
  19. Apple — 889
  20. SFR — 803
  21. Square — 786
  22. Docusign — 774%
  23. HSBC — 699
  24. Banque Populaire — 695

Roughly 4.2 billion phishing emails were sent in the month of June, a 284% increase over the start of the year. May wasn’t much better — there was a 281% spike.

The top phishing countries were:

  1. Brazil
  2. Russia
  3. Indonesia
  4. Ukraine
  5. Bangladesh
  6. United States
  7. Argentina
  8. Poland
  9. Turkey
  10. China
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