Small and Medium-sized businesses continue to be regular targets of cyberattacks. These threats are getting more progressively complex and determined since hackers and cybercriminals see some businesses as vulnerable and an easy target. The most common cyber-attacks businesses experience is:
- Phishing
- Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS)
- Password or Brute Force
- Ransomware
- Spyware
- Cross-Site Scripting
In cross-site scripting (XSS), the attacker aims to execute malicious scripts in a web browser of the victim by including malicious code in an official web page or web application. The actual attack cause when the victim visits the web page or web application that is executing the malicious code. The web application becomes a medium to deliver the malicious script to the user’s browser. Vulnerable mediums that are commonly used for cross-site scripting attacks are web pages, message boards, and forums.
A web page or web application is susceptible to XSS if it utilizes unsensitized user input in the output that it generates. The victim’s browser must then parse this user input.
- Insider
An insider threat can occur when someone close to an organization with authorized access misuses that access to impact the organization’s critical information or systems negatively. It is considered to be the deadliest among all cyber-attacks as they are at the mercy of fundamental human error. Most of the attacks happen by accident or out of the negligence of an employee, which can be avoided only by training the staff on cybersecurity awareness.
An insider threat may also be described as a threat that cannot be prevented by traditional security measures that aim at restricting access to unauthorized networks from outside the organization or defending against conventional hacking methods.
- Advanced Persistent Threats (APT)
An advanced persistent threat is an attack wherein an unauthorized user accesses a framework or network and remains there for a more extended period without being detected. Advanced persistent threats are particularly hazardous for enterprises, as hackers have ongoing access to sensitive organization data. Advanced persistent threats usually do not cause damage to organizations networks or local machines. Instead, the goal of advanced persistent threats is most often data theft.
Advanced persistent threats typically have several phases, including hacking the network, avoiding detection, constructing a plan of attack and mapping company data to determine where the desired data is most accessible, gathering sensitive company data, and exfiltrating that data.
- Macro Viruses
A macro virus is a computer virus written in the programming language that is used for software applications, such as macros for Microsoft office are currently written in Visual Basic for applications.
Macro viruses generally spread through phishing emails containing attachments that have been implanted with the virus. The virus will access the files in the recipient’s address book and send an infected email to everyone from the contact list.
As the email looks to be received from a reliable source, many email recipients open it. And once the infected macro is executed, it can jump to every other document on the user’s computer and infect them.
- SQL Injection
SQL injection attacks occur when an attacker injects a malicious query into an SQL database that forces the server to expose sensitive data from the database. The SQL query is executed into an input field on a webpage such as a login field through which an attacker cannot just peek into the database but also modify it. The attacker runs an administrative command to add, edit or expose the data or wipe it out from the database.
These are the most widely understood attack patterns. The growing businesses must make on-going cybersecurity training a priority for all employees while establishing a multi-layered security strategy. Proactively keeping employees safe online and using the latest threat intelligence to stop threats before and after they have entered the company network is more significant.
Other Types Of Cyber Attacks:
Zero-day Exploit
These exploits are carried out the duration when the vulnerability is identified, and a patch is released to cover it. Tools are created by hackers based on the type of vulnerability and launch them to exploit it for their benefit.
Birthday
This is basically a brute force attack who’s intention is to crash the hash algorithms. Another type of cryptographic attack where the targeted algorithms is checked the integrity of the data available.
Drive-by-downloads
Vulnerabilities are constantly searched on websites. Once these vulnerabilites are found they inject malicious code into the current PHP or HTTP code.
Eavesdropping attack
This attack intercepts a network and eavesdrops over the transmitting data. The attacker can therefore gain access to victim’s credential information which may include login details, credit card number, or passwords. procedure to defend from this type of attack is to use a virtual protocol network (VPN)
Middle Man
These are usually carried out on open and unprotected wi-fi connection. Free wi-fi connection in hotels, cafe’s and public places are where they strike. Hackers search for people using confidential information like credit card details on the internet.
posted by Pinnacle Marketing Dept
Tags : Cyber Attacks , IT Security Solutions
