How can you strengthen the security of Microsoft 365’s native anti-spam in the face of new phishing threats?

Is Microsoft 365 anti-spam effective in the face of increasingly sophisticated cyberthreats?

Why and how are cybercriminals targeting Microsoft 365 users?

Today, Microsoft is the company most targeted by hackers. In fact, Microsoft Office 365 is used by over a million businesses, holds 46% of the office suite market, and is used by over 350 million people. M365 users therefore represent a particularly attractive target for cybercriminals in search of sensitive data and files. This is becoming a problem for companies, especially those with insufficient resources to invest in cybersecurity teams or software. Email remains the main vector for cyberattacks against Microsoft Office 365.

What are the different types of threat?

• Phishing: one of the most widespread cyberattack techniques, it often takes the form of identity theft. In fact, Microsoft 365 is the world’s most stolen company, making it one of the biggest targets of this type of threat.
• Spear phishing: a more sophisticated variation of phishing where attacks are more personalized, with hackers creating a sense of urgency and fear, using different, hard-to-recognize pretexts and means of impersonation.
• Malware and ransomware: these threats use a variety of tools, such as polymorphic malware, metamorphic malware, code obfuscation, noise generation and even environment-aware malware, to enable hackers to bypass your e-mail security solutions.

What are the limitations of Microsoft Office 365’s native anti-spam?

Microsoft 365’s native anti-spam, known as Exchange Online Protection (EOP), has some important limitations:

1. False positives : Microsoft 365 anti-spam can sometimes incorrectly mark legitimate e-mails as spam, which can result in the loss of important communications.
2. False negatives: Conversely, it can also let spam or phishing e-mails through, exposing the organization to potential threats.
3. Limited protection against advanced threats: Microsoft 365’s native anti-spam offers basic protection against spam threats, but may be less effective at detecting advanced threats such as spear-phishing attacks, sophisticated malware, or targeted attacks.
4. Limited customization: Administrators have limited options for customizing anti-spam rules and security policies. This can make it difficult to implement company-specific security measures.
5. Lack of behavioral analysis: Microsoft 365’s native anti-spam focuses primarily on analyzing sender reputation and known malware signatures, but generally lacks behavioral analysis to detect emerging threats.
6. Increased risk of phishing attacks: Phishing attacks, particularly “phishing from within” or “whaling” attacks, can bypass native anti-spam by using sophisticated social engineering tactics.
7. Compliance limitations: Organizations subject to strict compliance regulations may need more advanced features to archive and manage their e-mails in line with legal requirements.
8. Microsoft Defender est requires resources (time/people), including an in-house cybersecurity team.

Despite an effective defense against unsolicited emails, Microsoft 365’s anti-spam isn’t enough. According to an IBM study, phishing attacks are the second most common cause of sensitive data breaches, yet Microsoft’s solution cannot counter them. Spear-phishing (BEC) attacks, meanwhile, cost companies an average of $4.89 million in 2021, making them the second most costly type of cyber attack worldwide. Again according to IBM, BEC attacks accounted for 6% of data breaches over this period.

What’s more, native M365 anti-spam cannot detect unknown malware and other types of sophisticated attacks. Hackers continue to find ways to evade security measures using techniques such as polymorphic malware, metamorphic malware, noise generation, code obfuscation, or even environment-aware malware. Nor does it protect your company against data loss problems, such as :

• accidental deletions,
• due to loopholes in the retention rules,
• following a migration,
• compliance issues…

Yet the stakes are high, because the lack of protection against data loss in Microsoft 365 can have serious repercussions for your business. In fact, it generates exorbitant costs in addition to an unreliability to your messaging when the key thing is to remain productive despite the many outages that Microsoft suffers on a daily basis. These unexpected outages should not have any impact on your availability. The anti-spam feature of Microsoft 365 is a solid complement to your protection, but it’s not enough on its own. To overcome these limitations, many organizations complement Microsoft 365’s native anti-spam with third-party security solutions. These solutions typically offer greater customization, more advanced behavioral analysis, real-time threat detection and more effective protection against sophisticated attacks.

How can you strengthen the protection of your M365 e-mail system against increasingly sophisticated phishing attacks?

To reinforce the protection of your e-mail, you need to ensure that it is well protected not only against spam, but also against viruses, phishing, spear-phishing, outages and all types of known and unknown malware. To achieve this, it is advisable to couple the solutions offered by Microsoft 365 with other complementary solutions based on artificial intelligence (AI) capable of exploiting real-time behavioral analysis and detecting unknown threats (malware, ransomware…).

In addition to anti-spam, complementary solutions should include at least anti-virus, anti-phishing and spear-phishing, anti-ransomware and anti-malware. Potential attacks very often depend on the assessment of your organization’s cybersecurity vulnerabilities. A successful targeted cyber-attack is the result of a lack of training and awareness among your staff (learning to recognize a phishing e-mail, for example). It is therefore essential to monitor more sophisticated attack techniques by investing in advanced filtering and detection solutions such as Altospam’s Mailsafe. It’s also crucial to develop a robust email security strategy tailored to your business, based on your needs and budget.

Microsoft 365 anti-spam coupled with other complementary solutions, will be able to offer a stronger defense against increasingly sophisticated phishing attacks. As a result, some organizations decide to adopt additional protection solutions capable of intercepting dynamic threats that elude Microsoft.

Hackers are now able to bypass most of the standard security mechanisms built into Exchange Online Protection (EOP). There are several ways of countering them and reducing the risk of increasingly sophisticated phishing attacks. One way is to train your staff: the more vigilant they are, the more they will have the right protection reflexes.

How can Altospam solutions enhance the security of your Microsoft 365 e-mail?

On Microsoft 365, basic anti-spam filtering is called EOP (Exchange Online Protection). For higher-quality filtering, you need to subscribe to ATP (Advance Thread Protection).

Altospam is 100% compatible and complementary with Microsoft 365. Mailsafe from Altopam detects and blocks threats with AI-based filtering, virus detection, anti-phishing, identity theft prevention, URL verification, as well as email authentication and encryption features. Altospam’s Mailsafe integrates 6 antivirus and 4 zero-day technologies. Setting up Mailsafe with Microsoft 365 is easy, and the entire technical procedure is accessible via the administration interface. Altospam Mailsafe (anti-phishing, anti-spearphishing, anti-ransomware, anti-malware) complements Microsoft 365’s native anti-spam, which is naturally less relevant for French-language messages. Here are just a few of the benefits of Altospam Mailsafe

1. Improved threat detection: through the use of advanced technologies (behavioral analysis, AI, blocking of sophisticated phishing, unknown malware, emerging threats…)
2. False-positive reduction: advanced algorithms reduce the risk of wrongly blocking legitimate e-mails as spam.
3. Protection against spear-phishing: effective analysis of spear-phishing attacks, enabling advanced threat detection (FOVI …)
4. Protection against zero-day malware with anti-malware
5. Protection against DDoS attacks
6. Protection against emerging threats: updated in real time, creating a robust defense against constantly evolving cybercrime tactics
7. Included DRP (Disaster Recovery Plan): ensures business continuity and data protection in the event of a service interruption (failure, vulnerability…) or prolonged unavailability of Microsoft 365 messaging.
8. Reports: statistics available on the interface

The combination of Altospam’s Mailsafe and Microsoft 365 anti-spam creates a solid bulwark against cyber-attack threats, ensuring the tranquility and reliability of your email. It provides more advanced protection as well as reduced risk of compromise in the face of increasingly sophisticated and ubiquitous threats.