We are in the run-up to the 2020 silly U.S. Presidential election season. Not much has changed in the three years after Trump operatives Russian hackers targeted and breached the email accounts of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Email security firm Agari reports that nearly all 2020 presidential candidates have learned nothing. They have not implemented email security. They are not protected against email attacks, fraud, and data breaches typically run by nation-states.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, the chairman of Hilary Clinton’s campaign, John Podesta, was the victim of a spear-phishing attack. That attack led to the now-infamous WikiLeaks email publication. The WikiLeaks release derailed the campaign and influenced the result of the election. Agari’s CMO, Armen Najarian, explained the importance of DMARC email protection;
DMARC is more important than ever because if it had been implemented with the correct policy on the domain used to spearphish John Podesta, then he would have never received the targeted email attack from Russian operatives.
Which campaign practices email security
Data released by the California-based firm found that just one presidential hopeful uses DMARC for email security. Democratic candidate Elizabeth Warren’s campaign is the only one that uses DMARC for email security. The Warren campaign has completely secured its campaign against the types of email threats that took down Clinton and harmed her campaign staff, potential donors, and the public.
Agari suggested in a blog post that the remaining 11 candidates it checked do not use DMARC. This includes Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, and presidential incumbent Donald Trump. All do not use DMARC on their campaign domains to secure their email accounts. The company warned that the candidates risk their campaigns being impersonated in spam campaigns and phishing attacks.
Agari also analyzed advanced email security controls of the campaigns. They found that 10 of 12 have no additional protection beyond basic security included in Microsoft Office 365 or Google Suite.
Email alphabet soup
DMARC is not an email authentication protocol. It sits on top of the authentication standards SPF (Sender Policy Framework) and DKIM (Domain Keys Identified Mail). With SPF and DKIM, DMARC supplements SMTP, the basic protocol used to send email, because SMTP does not include any mechanisms for email authentication.
A properly configured DMARC policy can tell a receiving server whether or not to accept an email from a particular sender. DMARC records are published alongside DNS records, including:
- SPF
- A-record
- CNAME
- DKIM
Matt Moorehead at Return Path explains that DMARC is the latest advance in email authentication. DMARC ensures that legitimate email properly authenticates against established SPF and DKIM standards and that fraudulent activity appearing from domains under the organization’s control is blocked. Two key values of DMARC are domain alignment and reporting.
DMARC’s alignment feature prevents spoofing of the email “header from” address. To pass DMARC, a message must pass SPF authentication and SPF alignment and/or DKIM authentication and DKIM alignment. A message will fail DMARC if the message fails both (1) SPF or SPF alignment and (2) DKIM or DKIM alignment.
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Using email authentication to prove that an email comes from the person it says it is is important because nearly 30% of advanced email attacks (PDF) come from hijacked accounts. Without email, authentication accounts are vulnerable to email security-initiated breaches – attacks typically run by nation-states. The 2018 Verizon DBIR found that nation-state groups accounted for at least 23% of the attacks in successful breaches by an outsider.
DMARC is a widely deployed technology that can make the “header from” address (what users see in their email clients) trustworthy. DMARC helps protect customers and brands; it discourages cybercriminals, who are less likely to target a brand with a DMARC record.
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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Keep your personal information private. Cybercriminals are always looking for ways to steal your personal information. If you receive a request to enter information like your credit card, email, home address, or social media log-in, Intel says you should not give it out thoughtlessly. Please research and ensure it’s not a phishing or scam attempt that could lead to identity theft.