At this time, we are witnessing a much higher risk of phishing and other cybersecurity attacks. Currently, most Covid-19 specific malware attacks are emanating from websites and social media in an effort to take advantage of the situation. Some of these threats are very malicious and suspected to be made by nation-state actors.

Please take extra caution with users trying to access newly found websites and anything that is suspicious. If your employees are looking for information, the best place to direct them to is the official government website: https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/coronavirus-disease-covid-19.html

We are advising all professionals to:

• Use official government sites for primary information (this means the above canada.ca, or sites ending in gc.ca)

• For news and general information, stick to official primary news websites, such as the CBC, CTV, Global etc.). Most of the threats and attacks have been coming via social media floods pointing to websites that look like news and info pages.

• Try not to repost or share content linked off social media pages unless they are confirmed sources, as you may be unwittingly propagating threats.

• When in doubt, fall back to the above, odds are it is at best reposted information from official sources, or worse, it is a crafted malicious website that could infect your computer or mobile device.

• If you are sent an email with a self assessment or Covid related attachment be extremely cautious.

Over the coming weeks, we will do our best to share important alerts that we are communicating with our clients in an effort to offer some guidance to the wider Vancouver Island business community, so that we can stay productive and safe during this time.