Cybersecurity is an area whose importance today is difficult to overestimate. Digitalization of life and business inevitably leads to the need to protect networks and individual devices from unauthorized access. Different approaches and tools are used for this, and turning to a dark web monitoring company is one of the effective methods for preventing the serious consequences of cyber attacks. In this article, you will learn about the most effective cyber attacks, as well as ways to protect a company from them.
Types of Cybersecurity Threats
Attempts to create new cybersecurity threats never cease, so information about existing types of threats is losing relevance at the speed of sound. At the moment, we can safely highlight several of the most famous types of penetration into information storage.
Backdoors
A general name for a number of hacking techniques by implanting special hardware or software add-ons into the operating system to gain access to information stored in databases.
Cybercriminals actively use backdoors created by hardware manufacturers to provide remote support or reset settings. Attackers contact users, posing as technical support employees, and ask for a password to confirm entry into the remote access system. The unsuspecting victim names the secret word, thereby giving the scammers the opportunity to download the files they are interested in.
DoS Attacks
Such cyber threats operate by deliberately breaking one or more corporate devices. Most often, infected technical means respond to hackers’ manipulations with short-term interruptions in operation, which is often enough to damage information storage. With full access to the system, programmers either immediately download the necessary files to their own media, or infect the system with a virus that does it for them. Backdoors in this case are good because they can be activated remotely.
Another type of such an attack is the deliberate blocking of accounts on important sites after the owner has incorrectly selected a password and login. As a result, the user cannot log in and gives up all attempts to do so. The purpose of such an attack is to affect the victim’s nervous state.
Network Traffic Interception
This scheme is used when fraudsters cannot penetrate the network directly. The point is that with the help of special software, attackers generate fake Internet distribution points, calling them the same as the ones the employee is used to. By visiting them, the naive employee opens up a huge scope for criminals to act. Ultimately, all secret information leaks into their hands.
Phishing
This term is familiar even to beginners in the online space. Most often, ordinary people fall for such scams, whose prey can be their finances. In the case of an attack on company employees, everything can be even more serious.
Social Engineering
Cybersecurity experts have good reason to consider the human factor to be the weakest aspect of protection. Criminals actively use this, using all the possibilities of social engineering. It is easy for them to obtain any personal data.
In addition, spoofing and typosquatting/cybersquatting are also popular.
Ensuring Cybersecurity in a Company
To improve the effectiveness of cybersecurity, a comprehensive approach is needed that combines the competent actions of employees, the correct implementation of the organization’s security policy, and the latest technological equipment.
Employees
Most of the company’s employees do not know what security threats exist and how to properly protect servers, devices, and networks. By conducting security training, you can significantly reduce the risk of an error leading to unnecessary consequences.
Process
Corporations and associations specializing in security and data protection on the Internet regularly create systems for tracking weaknesses in the company’s computing methods. Such systems help to respond much faster to hacking cases and promptly carry out recovery.
Technologies
Many organizations use cybersecurity technologies to enhance the protection of their devices, servers, networks, and data from possible threats. For example, companies use built-in protection, antivirus software, virus spyware, DNS filters and to automatically detect tools for monitoring the dark web to prevent unscheduled access to the company’s internal resources and systems or to detect leaks in time. Sometimes, enterprises use “zero trust” technologies to make the level of protection even higher.
The following tools are used to ensure the company’s cybersecurity:
- Encryption.
Don’t forget about data encryption. It will be useful to install proven encryption programs to protect the correspondence and files contained on the servers. Encryptors transform information by encoding it and blocking access to it for fraudsters even in the event of an attack.
- SIEM.
A system designed to manage information cybersecurity and security events (SIEM), with which you can easily monitor the work of each employee and the company as a whole online.
Artificial intelligence helps SIEM see and evaluate actions within the network and simply instantly correct any violations and inaccuracies that appear. The same program successfully fights cyberattacks.
- VPN.
VPN services help reliably hide your IP address from hackers and prevent them from connecting to the network and finding companies related to it.
- Antivirus and firewalls.
Firewalls and antiviruses are programs that stop malware when it gets into the operating system. They protect computers from employee errors and any failures. Among other things, firewalls are used to filter data between the PC and the network and help avoid cyber attacks. They can be used either separately or in tandem.
- IDS and IPS.
These are the systems that are designed to detect and prevent attempts to penetrate databases. They help to promptly pay attention to hacker attempts and minimize possible losses.
IDS is responsible for searching for failures and malfunctions in operation, notices suspicious persons accessing the system, and unwanted programs for installation. Among other things, with the help of this program, you can detect a violation, fix it, and find the cause. But there is one drawback. It only warns about threats, but does not eliminate them.
IPS is designed to detect violations in the system and block unwanted traffic, if necessary, resetting the connection.
Installation and operation of IDS and IPS are important not only for the prevention of cyber attacks but also for conducting an examination of judicial authorities when a cyber attack is recorded.
Final Thoughts
Ensuring cybersecurity in a company is an important process that involves many levels and a comprehensive approach. It includes updating software, training employees in the basics of information security, and using effective monitoring tools, in particular dark web monitoring. This is a practice that allows you to identify a possible data leak and its presence on the darknet, which allows you to quickly prevent serious consequences. We recommend contacting ImmuniWeb if you are interested in an agency that can help with dark web monitoring or other cybersecurity services.