Website impersonation is getting more rampant. A 2021 study found that on average, companies across various industries face nearly 1,100 spoofed domain threats per year. Moreover, Statista research shows that several of the world’s leading ecommerce websites, including Amazon, eBay, and Alibaba, have over 4,000 impersonating domains that simulate their website, appear legitimate, and harvest personal data from users unknowingly.
Also known as brandjacking, website impersonation is a serious issue that goes far beyond brand reputation; it directly affects customers, who can easily fall victim to fraud schemes, costing themselves, and the brands, billions of dollars.
With the increasingly sophisticated nature of fraud and the technology being used to carry it out, it has now become a matter of “when” rather than of “if” a brand’s website will be spoofed. Brands that do not prioritize putting effective cybersecurity measures in place to protect their customers from fraud are risking their entire customer-base’s trust, and significant financial losses. This is especially true for the banking and financial industries, which are now being held responsible for reimbursing fraud victims in the UK.
In the battle against digital fraud, Memcyco, a Tel Aviv-based company, is helping brands protect their digital properties – namely, their websites – from impersonation. Founded in 2021 by Israel Mazin, Eli Mashiah, Ori Mazin, and Gideon Hazam – all experienced startup founders in the cybersecurity space – Memcyco developed a technology called Proof of Source Authenticity (POSA)™, which delivers real-time protection against website spoofing for brands and their customers.
The POSA™ Multi-Layered Platform
Built on the POSA™ technology, Memcyco’s solution is a multi-layered detection, alerting, and prevention system for brandjacking that also offers a digital watermark for brands to display on their website for customers to recognize its authenticity.
The first layer is an advanced detection system designed to identify attacks in real time before any damage is incurred. It does this by using AI and machine learning to analyze user traffic and patterns of suspicious activity associated with a specific device or user. For example, it provides multiple credential attempt detection, password brute force detection, and access to the site through an unknown work environment and reverse engineering detection.
Source: Memcyco
The second layer of defense is complete, real-time visibility. In an attempted attack session, Memcyco sends full details of the attack to brands, including the identity of the user and attack location, enabling security teams to take immediate action. Simultaneously, customers that enter the spoofed site receive a Red Alert that warns them of fraudulent activity and to not trust the site.
The third layer is a digital watermark in the form of a randomly generated, unforgeable code that informs customers that they are visiting a genuine website (while at the same time maintaining user privacy). Customers can personalize the code and its associated image, which is displayed on the side of the website, to their preferences.
Let’s take a closer look at POSA’s™ multi-protection platform.
How Memcyco Addresses the Window of Exposure
The advanced detection and protection system alerts brands in real time if their website has been spoofed, enabling SOC teams to act immediately to prevent damage. If a site is spoofed, Memcyco displays a Red Alert to customers when they enter the site, warning them not to proceed or enter any personal information. Users see the Red Alert until the site is taken down, which Memcyco can also assist with.
Memcyco’s real-time approach is critical because takedown processes can take weeks, with organizations filing with domain registrars and having to prove that the site is indeed fraudulent. By the time the fraudulent site is taken down, the damage has already been done. By keeping users constantly deterred by the Red Alerts, Memcyco addresses this critical time window in which customers are the most exposed to fraudulent attacks.
Non-real time solutions to website impersonation often provide lists of suspicious domains attackers are using, which can actually grant them more time to outsmart detection if they move to execute the same attack from a different domain. Memcyco takes a more proactive approach by implementing imposter profiling, which details information about attackers to identify them quickly if they decide to attack again.
Here’s an example of a Red Alert for an impersonated website:
Source: Memcyco
The system provides the details of all end-users exposed to the attack and the profiles of the attackers. This is critical information for security and risk teams to give both an understanding of the scope of the attack and the type of attack they are dealing with.
A Digital Watermark to Recognize Website Authenticity
The other layer of the Memcyco solution is the digital watermark, which gives customers a positive confirmation of a brand’s authority and legitimacy of its website, promoting trust. The POSA™ watermark educates users quickly on the importance of being watchful of suspicious activity – for example, websites which do not display a watermark – without the need for any formal user education.
While customizable by the end user, the watermarks require no installation or registration. In addition, partner sites can use the watermark, helping organizations better defend themselves against attacks from unauthorized third parties.
Here’s an example of a watermark that communicates the authenticity of a website without any disruption to the user experience:
Source: Memcyco
Minimizing the Damages Associated with Digital Fraud
Memcyo’s POSA™ solution is built for brands to foster a positive, easy-to-use experience that promotes digital trust. As an agentless solution, no downloading or registration is required by the end user. Deployment begins automatically after adding a few lines of code to a brand’s website.
Along with delivering a positive user experience, POSA™ also provides risk and digital business teams contextual alerts of attacks on their brand in real time, eliminating false positives that traditionally overwhelm teams and lead to alert fatigue.
With POSA™, Memcyco addresses the needs of security and risk teams, helping them lower fraud remediation costs, reduce risk, and resolve customer-facing incidents quickly. If you’re a customer-facing brand looking to communicate to users the authenticity of your website, you might want to check it out.
