Brand Protection

What is Brand Protection

Brand protection is protecting your brand’s intellectual property from unauthorized use.

This includes your name, logo, trademarks, copyrights, and patents.

An effective brand protection strategy helps you identify and stop brand abuse before it affects business.

The goal is simple: prevent threats like domain name squatting, stolen credentials, and phishing attacks.

Why is Brand Protection Important

Malicious users impersonate brands to trick people into giving away personal info, money, or access to secure systems.

They create fake websites, emails, or social media accounts. The fake sites look completely legitimate. This fools people into sharing sensitive info, like passwords and credit card details.

Beyond data theft, attackers impersonate brands to spread malware or phishing links. This leads to significantly more damaging attacks.

Brand protection helps prevent fraud, data breaches, and, most importantly, loss of customer trust.

When customers lose trust, they take their business elsewhere. This ultimately hurts not only your brand’s reputation but also your bottom line.

Key Strategies for Effective Brand Protection

Here’s a breakdown of common brand protection strategies that can help:

• Cyber Threat Intelligence: Use cyber threat intelligence (CTI) to gather and analyze data on potential threats. These include leaked credentials, threat actors planning attacks, and attackers selling company assets.
• Domain Name Protection: - Protecting your domain is crucial. Register domain names that are similar to yours (to block cybersquatters). Use domain monitoring tools to track any unauthorized use of your brand online. This is key to avoiding phishing scams.
• Trademark Registration and Enforcement: Register your trademarks and actively enforce them. Monitoring for unauthorized use of your trademarks is crucial to preventing financial loss.
• Online Brand Monitoring: Use brand monitoring solutions to track instances of brand abuse. This includes phishing sites, fake social media accounts, and misuse of your brand assets.
• Anti-Phishing and Anti-Fraud Measures: Use anti-phishing tools to block sites that fraudulently target your brand. Stopping these threats early prevents employees from being tricked into disclosing sensitive data.
• Digital Rights Management (DRM): DRM tools help you protect digital content, like software and videos. They stop unauthorized copying, distribution, or access to it. This is particularly important for companies offering digital products.

Examples of Brand Impersonation Attacks

1. Facebook and Google Phishing Scam: A Lithuanian man, Evaldas Rimasauskas, tricked Facebook and Google into sending him over $100 million by impersonating a legitimate Taiwanese hardware company. This phishing scam involved fake invoices and forging invoices to appear as coming from a trusted business partner​.
2. Atlassian Data Leak: In February 2023, Atlassian experienced a data leak when hackers used stolen employee credentials to access a third-party vendor. The attackers leaked thousands of employee records, including email addresses, phone numbers, and office floor plans. This incident highlighted the risks associated leaked employee credentials.
3. Fake Elon Musk Twitter Scam: Scammers created fake Twitter accounts impersonating Elon Musk to promote cryptocurrency scams. They used hacked verified accounts and newly created fake accounts to tweet about fake cryptocurrency giveaways, tricking users into sending Bitcoin to fraudulent addresses.

How to Protect Against Brand Impersonation Attacks

• Monitor Social Media and Online Presence: Use automated tools to monitor social media and the web. Look for sites impersonating your brand, fake profiles, and unauthorized use of your brand name. Regularly search for variations of your brand name and logos. This will help you spot threats and fraud sites early.
• Secure Verification Processes: Ensure that all official social media accounts are verified. Verified accounts are less likely to be impersonated and easier for users to trust. Encourage customers to follow only verified accounts. Communicate the account names clearly on your official website and social media pages.
• Implement Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): Use MFA for all accounts. This is especially true for accounts that manage social media and online customer interactions. Mandate the use of a password manager to generate unique passwords. Another benefit of password managers is that they autofill credentials when logging in. This protects against phishing attacks.
• Educate Employees and Customers: Train employees to spot phishing and social engineering attacks. Give your customers an easy way to verify legitimate communications from your company.
• Legal and Policy Measures: Register trademarks and monitor for any infringements. Take legal action against misuse. Develop and enforce a clear policy for dealing with brand impersonation incidents. This should include response protocols and communication strategies.
• Security Basics: Ensure the fundamentals are in place, like patch management and vulnerability scanning. Conduct routine vulnerability scans to find issues in your network. Hire external pen testing consultants to bring a fresh perspective to your security management.
• Customer Support: Provide an easy way for customers to report impersonation attempts. Act quickly on customer reports and keep them informed about the actions taken.
• Data Breach Monitoring: Monitor for data breaches to get notified when employee or customer data is compromised. Use services that alert you to not only your organization but your vendors as well. Your data may be leaked in their breach.