Warning About Spear-Phishing Attacks

Spear-phishing e-mails have gotten more and more sophisticated within the past few years and are now extremely difficult to detect without prior knowledge on protection against spear-phishing. Spear-phishing attackers pose a serious threat, targeting individuals in an attempt to steal personal information. To increase success rates, these messages often contain urgent and somewhat credible explanations about why the targeted persons should open a malicious attachment or click on a link in the e-mail.

The attackers behind spear-phishing campaigns have found ways to develop rather convincing fake profiles, posing as trustworthy organizations, or even known acquaintances of the recipients of such e-mails.

We strongly advise all recipients of e-mails from an alleged DW sender, sent from an e-mail address that does not end with "@dw.com" to: ignore any possible requests for a return contact and refrain from clicking links in the e-mail or opening any attachments. Instead, please get in contact with staff at DW for confirmation.

Ingo Mannteufel, head of IT and Cybersecurity at DW

There also have been cases in which attackers have reached out to individuals by telephone, claiming to represent a known media outlet, or even impersonating journalists.

In these phone calls they ask for personal information, which no legitimate caller would ask for. We recommend extreme caution if you ever receive such a phone call.

The DW corporate communications department is always at your disposal to channel any such requests, should you not have any direct contact persons within DW: communication@dw.com