"I don’t need to worry about cybersecurity… my business is too small for hackers to target."
This is one of the most dangerous misconceptions a small business can have. If you believe this, you may not fully understand how modern cyberattacks work. Let’s break down why this mindset can leave your business vulnerable.
Over the past few years, huge scamming operations have operated in Southeast Asia, and now they are spreading. These scams—known as pig butchering scams—cause serious harm, as in an estimated $75 billion worldwide in 2023.
With these sorts of operations spreading, let’s go over what pig butchering is.
Potential data breaches are increasingly problematic for organizations, and the most common way that data is stolen is through phishing attacks. Phishing attacks are currently one of the most pervasive threats on the Internet, and you need to understand them to thwart their effectiveness against your users. Let’s explore what exactly a phishing attack consists of and some best practices you can use to defend your network against them.
Encryption is a powerful weapon against hackers that can prevent them from stealing your data and leveraging it against you. Encryption, in its most basic textbook definition, converts your readable data into an indecipherable jumble that can only be reassembled through the use of an encryption key. Small businesses absolutely must utilize encryption to protect customer information, financial records, and other important or sensitive business data. This ensures that it is as protected as possible against those that might do you harm.
Scammers look to take advantage of someone else for their own gain, but there are some scammers out there who are trying to scam the scammers to teach them a lesson. One such individual is “Kitboga,” a content creator who calls themselves a “scam baiter.”
Cyberthreats are increasingly sophisticated, and businesses have to do what they can to address these issues. Since cyberattacks can have a massively negative impact on your business, it stands to reason that you need a platform in place to enhance your employees’ awareness of Internet-based threats. This month we look at the top three IT security concerns businesses face and what should be done to confront them.
Safeguarding your online accounts is an important part of maintaining network security. With the increasing number of cyber threats, relying on strong, unique passwords is no longer optional—it's a necessity. Remembering complex passwords for numerous accounts can be challenging, however. This is where password managers come in handy, offering a secure and convenient solution to managing your credentials.
Today, cybersecurity is everyone's business. It's not just the IT department's job anymore. When a hack happens, it can feel like a personal violation. It's scary, confusing, and you might not know what to do next.
Believe it or not, if you were to rank your business’ greatest threats, risk factors, and vulnerabilities, your users would most likely belong somewhere toward the top. Human error is a big challenge to your security simply because cybercriminals understand that your employees are, in fact, human and will, in fact, make mistakes.
Let’s explore how cyberattacks exploit this tendency and how you can better protect your business from the ramifications.
Picture this scenario: while going about your daily routine, an email lands in your inbox, purportedly from a cybersecurity company. The alarming claim is that you've become the target of a hacking attack. Despite lacking IT expertise and being unfamiliar with your security agency's protocols, you trust the message and promptly respond. Little do you know, the email is a cleverly disguised cyberthreat, and you find yourself ensnared in their trap.
Technology and digital tools are a hot topic on our blog, but where there is technology, there is also data… and where there is data, there will be hackers trying to steal it. Data breaches are a common thread in all industries, and to prove this, we have put together six of the most notable data breaches from 2023. We hope you can learn a thing or two from them!
There are malevolent endeavors that happen with the utilization of what are known as "zero-day exploits" that launch attacks on your sensitive data and technological infrastructure. Today, we explain what a zero-day exploit is and why they are such a threat to business.
In both business and personal life, Facebook and other social media platforms have become a pretty fundamental part of how people do things. Not only do we keep in touch with our friends and families, we manage our business’ reputations through these accounts.
It’s borderline impossible to conduct any business online without seeing potential threats abound. It also doesn’t help that threats tend to disguise themselves to avoid being detected. Today, we want to share a social media threat that one of our employees discovered while going about their day, and we think even a cautious user could have been fooled by it.
We focus a lot of time and effort on securing our clients with our cutting-edge tools and industry best practices. Our adversaries, the hackers, on the other hand, have come to understand that the way they will be successful is to get their contrived messages in front of the least knowledgeable people in your organization. Let’s take a look at how hackers choose their targets to get a better understanding of what their strategy is.
Phishing attacks are one of the most common security threats to your business, not only because they are effective, but because they can be utilized in many different ways. You can become the victim of a phishing attack through email, instant message, phone, or even your voicemail. These “phoicemail” attacks are quite crafty in their approach, and you should be wary of them.
When it comes to your business’ cybersecurity, passwords are a pretty critical part of the system. This means that making sure they are secure is just as critical…however, that is not to say that this is easy. We, however, wanted to make sure that creating sufficiently secure passwords for all of your accounts is a far simpler prospect by the time we’re finished here.
At the end of January, the Federal Bureau of Investigation went public with an announcement that they had taken down the servers and Dark Web sites utilized by the Hive ransomware gang. This is a major victory, in terms of fighting cybercrime, but a certain statistic from this operation shows a somewhat disconcerting trend.
Artificial intelligence and machine learning are entering the mainstream technology discourse, and with software developing the ability to learn from datasets, many businesses are using this technology to automate their processes to cut down on costs and better use their current resources. There is a lot of good that comes from this, but only when you look past these benefits can you start to see the drawbacks, including an important one called “data poisoning.”
Cybersecurity is one part of your business’ computing that you must prioritize, as the fallout of a data breach could, in many cases, be enough to shutter your business for good. You want to be seen as a company that takes data security seriously, and to this end, you have likely implemented countless security features and measures to protect your organization’s resources and data. However, this all comes at a cost, and it’s not the one you might expect: your employees.
Card skimming is a very real problem for companies and individuals alike, but there will always be those who are more impacted by these kinds of financial scams—particularly those who rely on prepaid cards provided by the government for food assistance and so on.
What is your mother’s maiden name? What street did you grow up on? What is your favorite movie?
How about: What good do you really think these questions are going to do to help keep your accounts any more secure?
We haven’t been shy about pushing for multi-factor authentication, AKA MFA, and there’s a reason for that: if implemented correctly, it can help prevent many cyberthreats. Having said that, cybercriminals have managed to find a way to undermine MFA. Let’s consider how they’ve managed to do this.
It can be too easy to think about hackers and cybercriminals in an almost abstract way, diminishing them to little more than a faceless entity at a keyboard. Naturally, this is far from the truth. Let’s examine the reality of the cybercrime industry, which actually does as much harm to the perpetrators as it does to the people they scam...if not more.
Business owners often get unsolicited emails from individuals who want to sell them goods, services, or products. Depending on the message, they might even come across as a bit suspicious, prompting you to question the authenticity of the email. If you’re not careful, you might accidentally expose your organization by clicking on the wrong link in the wrong email, thus falling victim to the oldest trick in the book: the phishing attack.
Let me ask you a question… if you were a hacker, how quickly would you take advantage of newly disclosed bugs and other vulnerabilities? I’d bet it would be pretty quick, and industry experts agree. According to these experts, there’s less and less time for security professionals to react to vulnerabilities and zero-day threats… and it continues to shrink.
So, the question remains, how prepared is your business to respond when these kinds of vulnerabilities are taken advantage of?
Social engineering is a dangerous threat that could derail even the most prepared business. Even if you implement the best security solutions on the market, they mean nothing if a cybercriminal tricks you into acting impulsively. Let’s go over specific methods of social engineering that hackers might use to trick you.
Hacking attacks can be stressful to manage, but when you add in that they can strike when you least expect them to, it gets a lot worse. You’ll never know how you respond to such an event unless you simulate it and replicate it somehow. This is what the penetration test is used for; it provides your business with a way to prepare for cyberattacks.
Despite their best efforts, cybersecurity can be a major cause for concern for all kinds of businesses and organizations. Even with a full team of cybersecurity professionals, data breaches can occur, and many of the worst data breaches of 2022 have been quite devastating. Let’s take a look at some of the worst ones so far.
Cybersecurity is not easy to manage, and even professionals have their work cut out for them against modern threats like ransomware and other high-profile security threats. Today, we want to educate you on some of the terminology used in cybersecurity, namely the relationship between a vulnerability and an exploit, as well as what you can do to keep the risks associated with both relatively low.
Phishing attacks are serious business, so it is important that your team members know what they are, for one, and know how to spot them. To facilitate this, let’s review the signs of a phishing attack—or ideally, a phishing attempt (because by spotting it, you’re more able to stop it).
There are times when you, as a business owner, might receive unsolicited emails from organizations asking you to try a product or asking for your input on something. More likely than not, the one responsible used data scraping to get your contact information. If it’s used appropriately, data scraping can be an effective marketing tool, but it can also be utilized by scammers to make your life miserable.
Do you ever see an advertisement for a free download of a popular Windows application and think, “Wow, this sure sounds too good to be true!”? Well, it most definitely is, and hackers use these malvertisements to infect computers with malware and other threats. Specifically, malvertising is used to download three different types of malware, all of which can cause harm to unwary businesses.
When we think about security and hackers, it’s easy to think of them all as the bad guys. However, this is far from the truth. Just like with other areas of life, there is a shade of gray involved with hacking, and there are good guys that use these skills to benefit others while the bad guys try to exploit them for their gain.
The past couple of years have been difficult for businesses, regardless of if they are large organizations or small businesses. Likewise, cybersecurity has been a challenge. Let’s take a look at what 2022 could pose for cybersecurity, especially considering recent trends.
Dealing with a hacked computer can be scary, but depending on the severity of the hack, you might not even know your infrastructure has been breached until it’s too late to stop it, putting you in a reactionary position. Let’s go over some of the telltale signs of a computer hack and what you should do about it.
For twenty years, hackers have tried to breach organizational networks by finding or breaking holes in the network’s perimeter, or in exposed servers. This led to the cybersecurity industry creating software designed specifically to stop these threat actors in the act. This, in essence, created a situation where the perimeter of an organization’s network was extremely hard to breach. The problem was that as soon as something was able to get through the outer defenses, there was no end to the devastation a hacker could cause inside a network.
A recent trend even amongst ransomware threats is that the FBI is issuing warnings regarding how dangerous it is or how difficult certain variants are. This particular threat—the OnePercent ransomware gang—is no exception. Let’s break down what you need to know about the OnePercent Group and how you can prepare to handle attacks not just from this threat, but most ransomware threats.
Data breaches are a well-known fact in the business environment, and small businesses in particular have many challenges that threaten their operations. It is important that you consider these security issues when putting together your risk management strategy, especially as it pertains to cybersecurity. Let’s take a look at how you can overcome some of the security challenges present for small businesses in 2021.
There is no denying that the cloud has become one of the most popular options for a business to obtain the tools required for their operations. Despite this, it is equally important to acknowledge that there are many ways that the cloud could facilitate security threats if not managed properly. Let’s go over some of the issues that must be addressed if a business is going to successfully leverage cloud technology to its advantage.
In May of 2021, Ireland’s Health Service Executive, which handles healthcare and social services to the Emerald Isle’s nearly five million residents, was the target of a massive ransomware attack. Even as businesses and municipalities from all over the globe have been dealing with this plight, we mention this because of the aftereffects of this situation. Today, we take a look at the situation and what can be learned from it.
If a hacker were to find themselves on your network or within one of your accounts, would you be able to detect them and eliminate them? Today we want to share some of our best strategies for how you can identify the warning signs of a hacking attack, as well as how you should respond. This is particularly important for a workforce that is working remotely, so we hope you take these tips to heart.
Network security isn’t just for large, high-profile enterprises; even small businesses need to take it seriously. All businesses have something of value to hackers, and if you don’t believe this is the case for your organization, think again. All data is valuable to hackers, and you need to do everything in your power to protect it—especially against threats like Agent Tesla, the latest version of phishing malware designed to steal your data.
A recent surge of high-profile ransomware attacks strikes again with an assault on the world’s largest meat processor and distributor, JBS S.A. The cyberattack was so disruptive that the company was forced to suspend operations in both North America and Australia, leading to a considerable impact on the supply chain. Let’s take a deeper dive into what lessons can be learned from this situation.
It’s no secret that software often does not work as intended. Developers frequently discover bugs and patch them out. The same can be said for security vulnerabilities. Despite the importance of these updates, small businesses often fail to implement these patches and updates in a timely manner, a practice which can lead to more problems down the road.
We’re all familiar with the idea that pop culture has cultivated in our minds about computer hackers, but as it happens, this impression is just one of the many shapes that the modern hacker can take. This kind of closed-off view is dangerously shortsighted, so let’s take a few moments to dig into the kinds of hackers there are, in ascending order of the threat they pose to your business.
Contemporary movies are filled with high-stakes cybercrime, where a lovable criminal syndicate breaks into a company’s systems to help wreak havoc on the true villains of the film, all the while exposing the company’s dirty laundry. Naturally, this idea can be frightening for any business, whether or not they have any dirty laundry to air out—after all, nobody wants a ruined reputation—and is unfortunately less and less of a fantasy all the time.
As commonly happens with any disaster, COVID-19 has inspired no short supply of scams. While these scams initially focused upon the relief funds that were delivered to people to help sustain the suffering economy, the ongoing vaccine distribution efforts have given those behind these efforts a new means of attack.
Recently, a story broke in Florida that sounds like something out of a terse action film: a hacker managed to access a water treatment facility and subjected the Pinellas County water supply with increased levels of sodium hydroxide. While onsite operators were able to correct the issue right away and keep the public safe from danger, this event is the latest in a line of cyberattacks directed at public utilities. Let’s consider this unpleasant trend.
Browser extensions are nifty little programs that can be implemented into your web browser itself, adding onto its capabilities and utility… at least, that’s the concept. Unfortunately, these programs also give cybercriminals a means of secretly launching an attack. The security firm Avast recently identified 28 such third-party extensions that have been installed—according to the download numbers, at least—by about three million people on Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge combined.
As compared to the past few years, there have been considerably fewer successful data breaches in 2020. While this may sound like exclusively good news, there are a few reasons why this information should be taken with a grain of salt.
To effectively manage the risk that your business is under due to cybercriminals and their activities, it is important to acknowledge what attacks your business may soon have to deal with. Due to the increased accessibility of artificial intelligence and related processes, we predict that cybercrimes will likely use AI to their advantage in the very near future.
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a great number of people working from home. While this is good for the public health, it may unfortunately lead your employees toward a laxer view of cybersecurity. Cybercriminals are sure to take advantage of this if you aren’t careful, so it is important to be particularly aware of your cybersecurity right now.
Imagine for a second what would happen if your business’ data was exposed and stolen. You’d have a really difficult time going forward as your client-base dwindled and you opportunities for growth dried up. The amazing part is that some very successful companies have this type of thing happens all the time. Today, we will look at some of the largest data breaches since September 1.
Most people know what a URL is. It’s the address of a website, typically starting with http:// or https://, and it is essentially the location of a web page or application that can be accessed through a web browser or application. Nowadays, URLs are being manipulated by actors for both positive and negative means. Let’s take a look at URL manipulation and how it could affect you.
In 2018, Amazon was struck by a considerable attack, with hackers taking funds from approximately 100 seller accounts, according to a Bloomberg report. Between May and October 2018, Amazon sellers were struck approximately 100 times, draining funds from the seller control platform to augment their own funds. According to the investigation, the first fraudulent transaction took place on May 16, 2018, with an undisclosed amount being stolen. The hackers utilized phishing attacks in order to scam their targets.
Do you ever think of your business as too small of a target to matter to hackers? Some organizations actually do believe this, and that notion is effectively a trap. The thing that all businesses need to keep in mind is that all organizations, regardless of which industry they fall into, as all companies have data that’s valuable to hackers. We’re here to prove it and ensure you know the best way to protect your data.
Blockchain technology is all the rage these days. Business owners are going to start hearing this buzzword as a bullet point in software solutions. Developers from all over the world are trying to harness the power of encrypted, distributed data, mainly due to the reputation that blockchain has regarding the “unhackable” permanence of the data stored upon it. However, it as powerful as blockchain is purported to be, it isn’t totally infallible.
Chances are, you’ve heard of “phishing” - a cybercriminal’s scam that steals data, access credentials, and other sensitive information by fooling a user into thinking they are providing this information to someone who is supposed to have access to it. However, there are a few different kinds of phishing, based on how it is carried out. Here, we’ll discuss the realities of spear phishing, and the risks it poses to your business.
Countless threats stand between your business and productivity, even if modern security solutions have prevented the majority of them from ever becoming a problem. The fact remains that, unless you’re being proactive about security, your organization could face a considerable challenge in keeping its network secure from intruders. We’ll delve into what some of these threats are, why they are such an issue, and what you can do about them.
Hackers have the ability to cripple systems and steal important (or sensitive) data, and if you’re not careful your business could become their latest victim. Here are five ways that you can make it more difficult for hackers to infiltrate your systems and steal your data.
It’s not an understatement to suggest that hackers are a hindrance to business. They take what doesn’t belong to them, and worse than that, they use that stolen information to make off with money, misrepresent individual actions, and ultimately, just cause a degree of added entropy that any business simply doesn’t need. Recently, with the hacker group Anonymous consistently in the news and dozens of corporate hacks resulting in millions of people’s personal information being compromised, hackers have been an increased part of the public consciousness.
Hackers are notorious for committing cybercrimes and exploiting what seems like everybody and anybody. Yet, just as there exists honor among thieves, there’s an unwritten rule within the hacking community: leave hospitals alone.
The challenge for business owners is that there are so many different types of online threats, it borders on impossible to protect themselves from all of them. All of these threats hold limitless possibility to ruin your organization’s operations, either short-term or long-term. One of the most common threats out there is called a rootkit hack, and it’s one that you certainly don’t want to mess around with.
“Hacker” is a word that can bring up many powerful impressions in people. It may very well bring up images of a pale super genius hunched over a keyboard, awash in dim blue light, as it does for many people. However, this extremely specific image does little but pigeonhole the many hackers in the real world into this dramatized caricature.
Fact: your business will always be susceptible to various security threats in at least some capacity. It’s up to you to counter these threats before falling victim to them. To help you with this, we’ll go over the top five threats that you need to be prepared for.
Man matching wits with computer isn’t new territory. In 1830, a locomotive raced a horse to see which was superior in terms of speed and distance. 1956 saw the first time a human played chess against a computer. Today, the time has come when an artificial intelligence has begun to break into a new territory that was dominated by humans for thousands of years: crime.
While many youngsters enjoy it when their school shuts down, this was likely not the case in Flathead Valley, Montana, where the cybercriminal group ‘TheDarkOverlord Solutions’ targeted the entire Columbia Falls school district. This attack caused the three-day closure and otherwise disrupted over 30 schools, and the personal information of teachers, students, and school administrators was supposedly to be released if the group didn’t receive a ransom payment.
One of the most enticing credentials that hackers desire is your credit card number, along with its expiration date and the code on the back. Hackers are also willing to go great lengths to achieve their goal of stealing these credentials, even so far as to make physical changes to automatic teller machines (ATMs) to do so. In fact, hackers will often install skimming devices on ATMs that are so subtle that they can be difficult to detect.
The IRS has issued a warning to tax professionals to step up their cyber security to prevent sensitive taxpayer information from being stolen. CPA firms, large and small, are being targeted by hackers and identity thieves, especially during the high traffic tax season.
Network security is a crucial consideration for every contemporary business owner, as there are just too many threats that originate from an Internet connection to be overlooked. One only has to look at what businesses of all sizes have dealt with, even within this calendar year, to gain an appreciation for how crucial it is that every business owner consider their cybersecurity.
If there is any solution that is a constant across businesses, it would have to be the use of email. This also means that the risk of threats coming in through an email solution is also present in businesses of every shape and size. How is this shaping our approach to security now, and how will this shift in the future?
There are literally billions of sports fans in the world, and the popularity of these events brings in big money; and big money typically attracts hackers. Using all types of methods, there has been a history of hacking in almost every sport. Today, we take a look at some of the most famous hacks that have shaken up the sports world.
Thanks to the advent of artificial intelligence, cybersecurity professionals have to reconsider how they approach these threats. Machine learning is one option, as it can help today’s modern solutions learn how to be more effective against advanced threats. On the other hand, what’s stopping the other side from also taking advantage of artificial intelligence? The answer: nothing, nothing at all.
The holiday season is a prime opportunity for hackers to steal considerable amounts of money and credentials from unwary shoppers, both online and in-store. When a lot of customers spend so much money, it’s inevitable that some of these credentials will be stolen by hackers seeking to snatch a credit card number or personal data. How can you protect yourself from a threat that’s not necessarily handled directly by you?
If your company’s sensitive data was to be put up for sale, how much do you think it would go for? Chances are, you may be guessing a little high, which makes things worse for businesses in such a situation. Assuming that your data will be sold for a premium price will likely lead you to believe that fewer criminals will access it than actually will.
How does your business handle threats to its data security? You might think you’re safe, but according to the Ponemon Institute, nearly four out of every five organizations aren’t prepared to fend off threats to their security. This is a major problem, so it should make you question whether you’re prepared to handle the various security risks that could potentially plague your business.
What would you do if a significant sum of money magically disappeared from your account due to a “miscommunication” between accounting and someone pretending to be you? Wire transfers have made it extraordinarily easy for scam artists to make large transactions, which are augmented by the ability to impersonate authority figures within the office; the c-suite staff, also known as management.
Windows is perhaps the most common workplace computing tool, and hackers have been trying for decades to uncover holes in its security. In some cases, like with unsupported operating systems, they’ve succeeded. However, Microsoft’s latest addition to their OS family, Windows 10, seems to have exceptionally potent built-in security measures, many of which have the hackers at the Black Hat conference scratching their heads and scrambling to find threats to talk about.
With all of the major data breaches making the news these days, it’s not very surprising when you hear about a new one. However, what is surprising is just how much the average cost per breach has skyrocketed in recent years. The cost of data breaches is up 29 percent since 2013, which equates to roughly $4 million per data breach.
Hackers of all shapes and sizes use brute force attacks to gain access into accounts and infrastructures, but do you know how they work and what your business can do to protect against them? Failing to understand brute force attacks could put sensitive information in the crosshairs of hackers, and leave it vulnerable to ongoing attacks.
Did you know that some of the most successful hackers actually know very little about computer coding? In many cases, a hacker simply tricking someone into handing over their personal information works out even better for them. This is a tactic known as social engineering, and the only way to defend against it is to stay one step ahead of the hacker’s devious plans.
The Internet is a fascinating and wonderful place full of great, informative resources and websites, but it’s also home to online markets for illegal and unethical practices. These hotbeds of criminal activity are a danger not only to your business, but to everyone who uses the Internet.
2015 saw a significant increase in high-profile hacking attacks in organizations of all disciplines: healthcare, government, and even large entertainment companies all fell victim to data breaches. In light of these attacks, valuable lessons can be learned through analyzing the types of records that were stolen. In 2015, over half of all records exposed to hackers were passwords and email addresses.
The Internet of Things is practically omnipresent in today’s environment, and many commercial products not only connect to the Internet, but they also come with an app. Due to this type of integration growing more popular, the world is starting to see Internet-connected products that really don’t have much to gain from their connectivity.
Hackers are notorious for exploiting technology for their benefit, but users often forget that mobile devices are exploited just as often as desktops and workstations; perhaps more so, due to their higher exposure to wireless networks that may not be secure. One of the greatest threats to mobile devices is the botnet, which is designed to enslave a device and have it turn on its owner (and the entire Internet).
We all know that hackers are never good news. All they want to do is ruin someone’s day by planting a threat in an innocent person’s PC or steal some data from a business. However, some hackers could potentially have much more dangerous (and deadly) agendas, like sabotaging hospital equipment.
There’s a wicked string of malware on the Internet that locks users out of their browser and directs them to call a phone number. That phone number reaches hackers who have set up a subterfuge as an IT support company. If this happens to you, even if you are in the middle of something important, do not call the phone number.
Requesting a ransom from victims is an unfortunate trend gaining momentum in the hacking world. This is typically done using ransomware (where hackers encrypt data and request money for the key) and distributed denial of service attacks (where hackers threaten to overwhelm a system with traffic, thus knocking it offline). In both scenarios, hackers are looking for the victim to pay up, or else. Should they?
These days, mobile exploits aren’t anything to be surprised about. Most people consider their smartphones to be more secure than their desktops or laptops, but the fact remains that there are just as many exploits, if not more, for mobile devices as there are for PCs. One of the latest mobile threats that can infiltrate your iPhone or Android device takes advantage of Siri and Google Now.
With new threats emerging all of the time, it’s no wonder that cybersecurity is such a major part of any technological endeavor. Your should be using the most powerful security solutions on the market in order to avoid intensive hacks. Despite the emphasis that our society places on security, it takes a high-notoriety hack to truly shake the public into action; for example, what if the Central Intelligence Agency were hacked by a teenager?
As a business owner, you understand that there are always criminals on the lookout waiting to take advantage of the slightest crack in your defenses. They want to steal from you and see you fail. Cyber security is one of the most important avenues of defense your business should take advantage of, especially considering the fact that most threats to your organization aren’t apparent until it’s too late.
People often blame technology for not doing its job in the face of hacking attacks. While this is certainly true, only half of the fault lies with the technology. The other half, whether we like to admit or not, comes from the people using technology. This brings up an interesting ultimatum; only humans can prevent hacking attacks from happening altogether. If people don’t protect their data, it’s only natural that it will eventually get attacked.
Hackers make life difficult for even the most innocent Internet user, and it’s all thanks to a nasty little trick called reverse-engineering. This is when a hacker picks apart the code that makes up a program, then scans it for vulnerabilities or exploitations. A new type of security measure is being developed to protect against the reverse-engineering of software.
As seen by the recent Superfish app debacle, software that comes preinstalled on a new PC shouldn’t always be trusted. Most of the time, the innate software on a device can be trusted; but the Superfish application is an exception. This app, which came preinstalled on new Lenovo PCs between the months of September and December of 2014, can potentially compromise the security of your machine.
We’ve mentioned distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS) before, and we’ve emphasized the importance of protecting yourself from threats which can cause downtime. However, we think the recent attacks by Lizard Squad take DDoS to an entirely new level.
We’re so busy worrying about hackers that we rarely think about how they acquire the tools they need to steal you out of house and home. One reason that the surge of hacking activity has skyrocketed over the past few years is because hacking tools have become more readily available, through an illegal black market known as the Darknet.
Last year, a Washington DC restaurant called the Serbian Crown was forced to close its doors to the public. Instead of chowing down on delicacies such as lion, horse, and kangaroo meat, customers can now only sink their teeth into disappointment. The reason? A nasty Google Maps hacker, and lack of brand management to help clean the mess up.
Naturally, if you saw your lamp levitate, you would believe it to be the work of a ghoul and you would cry out in terror. What then would you believe if you saw your PC’s cursor begin to move on its own? In a spooky scenario like this, your computer isn’t haunted. It’s hacked. In the real world, the latter is the scarier of the two.
Sometimes it seems like the Internet is plotting against you, and nothing is safe, ever. Even if you don't have any thugs waiting to steal your data, there are hackers - thieves - who will steal it anyway, waiting to take it when you least expect it. One of the most secure ways to protect your company's digital assets is to enact a "zero trust" policy for your network.
