When a Phished Employee Has Admin Rights

When a Phished Employee Has Admin Rights TL;DR Phishing remains one of the most effective initial access methods for attackers—but the real risk begins when the compromised user has admin or privileged rights. In this post, we’ll dissect how privilege escalation turns a single click into a breach, the downstream impacts, and practical steps to contain the blast radius in your own organization. The Real-World Scenario: One Click, Total Compromise Let’s paint a picture....

July 3, 2025 · 4 min · Jay Klinkowsky

The High Cost of Poor Privileged Account Management

The High Cost of Poor Privileged Account Management In the past year, several major security breaches were traced back to basic failures in privileged account management. Weak controls on admin-level accounts – from not using multi-factor authentication (MFA) to poor password hygiene – have proven to be low-hanging fruit for attackers. Microsoft reports that over 99.9% of compromised accounts lacked MFA, making them easy targets for password attacks ( Security at your organization - Multifactor authentication (MFA) statistics - Partner Center | Microsoft Learn )....

March 14, 2025 · 13 min · Jay Klinkowsky