With the increasing volume of data, devices, programs, and users in the modern enterprise, implementing effective cybersecurity measures can be challenging.
Attackers will keep finding new and creative ways to break even the most sophisticated of barriers. Understanding cybersecurity to help identify the best practices to prevent unauthorised access to networks and data has never been more crucial.
Cybersecurity
Cybersecurity is known as electronic information security or information technology security. It is a body of practices, processes, and technologies designed to defend electronic systems, mobile devices, data, servers, and networks from malicious attacks or unauthorised access.
Cyberattacks are usually orchestrated to access, change, or destroy confidential or sensitive information and in some cases to interrupt regular business processes for reasons or sabotage or extortion.
Types Of Cybersecurity
The term cybersecurity can be used in different contexts from mobile computing to business, and can be divided into several different focuses.
Network Security: This is when a computer network is secured from opportunistic malware or targeted attackers.
Application Security: For software to be kept safe and free of threats, its security has to be designed concisely to prevent its data from being compromised.
Information Security: The privacy of data in transit and storage are protected with information security.
Operational security: This deals with user permission and access including the decisions and processes involved when handling data assets.
Disaster Recovery And Business Continuity: An organisation’s response to cyber-security incidents or any other event that causes the loss of data falls under this umbrella. In the absence of certain resources, fall-back options need to be put in place for operations to continue.
End-user Education: Humans are liable to make mistakes and in business a small mistake can lead to the introduction of a virus, so good security practices and policies must be followed to ensure a secure system.
Why Cybersecurity is even more important with the evolution of new technologies
IoT And 5G
Our society is become more dependent on technology and this trend increases on a daily basis. The introduction of new technologies such as IoT and 5G networks creates more room for vulnerability due to the expanded and faster nature of their networks.
An increase in the number of connected devices can bring about numerous multidimensional cyberattacks. Therefore, a well-defined and regularly updated cyber strategy is vital.
Greater Use Of Cloud Computing
A market study by Canalys in 2019 revealed how cybersecurity deployment had a 46 percent year-on-year increase. This shows that organisations and businesses believe in cybersecurity solutions for public cloud as a service.
Cloud computing services are increasingly being deployed, but hackers are also increasing their knowledge with the use of machine learning and artificial intelligence to carry out their cyberattacks. This reinforces the need for cybersecurity to prevent and avoid automated cyberattacks.
Threats to Cybersecurity
Nowadays, there is a concern for the need to shield information from malicious parties even at the highest levels of business. The sophistication of cyber attackers and their growing volume pose a serious danger.
Organisations that have a sole dependency on customer’s data can have their databases breached. In 2017, credit reporting company Equifax had its database compromised and 147.9 million people’s personal information stolen (more than twice the population of the UK).
Types Of Cybersecurity Threat
Here are types of threats that are not only present today but will continue in the future.
Malware
Malware is one of the most popular cyber threats. It is a type of malicious software used by cybercriminals to damage or harm a user’s computer. They are often spread through legitimate-looking downloads and unsolicited email attachment. Types of malware include:
Trojans are disguised as legitimate software on user’s computers and are used to collect data.
Spyware programs are used to secretly record what a user does. They could be used to capture credit card or cloud login details for example.
Ransomware works just like blackmail. A user’s files or data are encrypted, and will only be decrypted when a ransom is paid.
Phishing
Phishing is a generic email or messaging attack that is performed on a large scale, where the same message is sent to many unconnected mailboxes and the distribution is large. Commonly a phishing attach will try to take the user to a fake site where the user may be tricked in to entering sensitive data like credit card numbers or supply real login details for a service.
Spear Phishing attacks are more targeted and can come across as legitimate email or text messages from a colleague or business partner. Cybercriminals target victims in a refined form of social engineering by supply some real and familiar details, causing the user to lower their guard and think they are communicating with someone they know.
Insider Threats
Insider threats can be negligent or malicious. Caused mostly by humans, they involve losses or security breaches by customers, contractors, or employees.
Social Engineering
This usually involves breaking security procedures by relying on human interaction in a bid to gain sensitive information. Cybercriminals employ different tricks to carry out this type of attack.
Distributed Denial-of-service (DDoS)
Attacks are directed at a website, server, or other network resources with a flood of connection requests, messages, or packets. The attackers make use of multiple systems to disrupt the traffic of the targeted system thereby overloading or slowing down the system.
Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs)
This is where the infiltration method is used to manipulate a server in a prolonged targeted attack with the aim of stealing data and staying undetected.
Man-in-the-middle (MitM)
Messages between two parties are intercepted by an attacker and the information stolen without the two parties’ knowledge.
Other
There are other popular attacks such as vishing, credential stuffing attacks, drive-by-download attacks, botnets, malvertising, exploit kits, zero-day exploits, SQL injection attacks, and business email compromise (BEC).
Cybersecurity Tips
- Keep systems updated with the latest security patches
- Employ the services of reliable and trusted antivirus software and security solutions for a better level of protection
- Ensure your passwords are strong and difficult to guess
- Beware of opening unknown email attachments or links that could be infected with malware
- Avoid unsecured networks, like public WiFi, as these can be used to execute man-in-the-middle attacks.
Conclusion
Cybersecurity is the hope for the future of technology. Not only are the number of attacks growing, but they are also becoming harder to prevent.
Cyber vigilance is an important attribute in the cybersecurity setting. Educating your organisation about popular attacks such as typosquatting, phishing emails, and other social engineering scams is also very important.
To thwart any serious cyberattack, a multi-layered cybersecurity approach involving a standard combination of software and firewalls is recommended.
