What exactly is a cyber-attack?
We will first walk you through a cyber-attack before moving on to the various sorts of cyber attacks. A cyber-attack occurs when a third party gains illegal system/network access. A hacker/attacker is someone who perpetrates a cyberattack.
Cyber-attacks have a number of harmful consequences. When an assault is carried out, it might result in data breaches, which can result in data loss or manipulation. Organizations suffer financial losses, customer trust suffers, and reputations suffer. We implement cybersecurity to prevent cyberattacks. Cybersecurity is the process of preventing unwanted digital access to networks, computer systems, and their components.
The COVID-19 incident has also had a negative influence on cybersecurity. According to Interpol and WHO, the number of cyberattacks has increased significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Now that you understand what a cyber attack is, let’s look at the many sorts of cyberattacks.
Cyber Attack Types:
In today’s society, there are numerous types of cyber attacks. Knowing the various forms of cyberattacks makes it easier to safeguard our networks and systems from them. We will look closely at the top ten cyber-attacks that, depending on the scale, might impact an individual or a major corporation.
Let us begin with the various sorts of cyberattacks on our list:
- Malware Infection
This is a sort of cyberattack that is quite widespread. Malware is a term that refers to malicious software viruses such as worms, spyware, ransomware, adware, and trojans.
The trojan infection masquerades as legal software. Spyware is software that steals all of your personal data without your awareness, whereas Ransomware prevents access to the network’s vital components. Adware is software that shows advertising content on a user’s screen, such as banners.
Malware infiltrates a network by exploiting a vulnerability. When a user opens a harmful link, an email attachment is downloaded, or an infected pen drive is used.
How to avoid Malware Attack:
Make use of antivirus software. It can shield your machine against infection. Popular antivirus software includes Avast Antivirus, Norton Antivirus, and McAfee Antivirus.
Make use of firewalls. Firewalls filter the traffic entering your device. Windows Firewall and Mac Firewall are the default built-in firewalls of Windows and Mac OS X, respectively.
Keep an eye out for questionable links and avoid clicking on them.
Regularly update your operating system and browsers.
- Phishing Attack
Phishing attacks are one of the most common types of cyberattacks. It is a sort of social engineering attack in which the attacker poses as a trusted contact and sends the victim bogus emails.
Without realizing it, the victim opens the email and clicks on the malicious link or opens the attachment. As a result, attackers obtain access to sensitive information and account credentials. A phishing attack can also be used to install malware.
How to avoid Phishing attacks:
Examine the emails you receive. Most phishing emails contain substantial flaws, such as spelling issues and formatting differences from authentic sources.
Utilize an anti-phishing toolbar.
Keep your passwords up to date.
- Password Cracking
It is a type of attack in which a hacker cracks your password using numerous password-cracking programs and tools such as Aircrack-ng, Cain, Abel, John the Ripper, Hashcat, and others. Password attacks are classified into three types: brute force attacks, dictionary attacks, and keylogger attacks.
How to avoid password assaults:
Make use of strong alphanumeric passwords that include special characters.
Use different passwords for different websites or accounts.
Update your passwords to reduce your vulnerability to a password assault.
There should be no password clues visible.
- Man-in-the-Middle Attack
A Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) assault is also referred to as an eavesdropping attack. In this attack, an attacker intercedes between two parties, i.e., the attacker hijacks the session between a client and a host. Hackers steal and modify data.
How to avoid MITM attacks:
Consider the security of the website you’re utilizing. Encrypt all of your devices.
Avoid utilizing public Wi-Fi networks.
- SQL Injection Attack
When a hacker manipulates a conventional SQL query on a database-driven website, a Structured Query Language (SQL) injection attack occurs. It is carried out by injecting malicious code into a vulnerable website search box, causing the server to divulge sensitive information.
As a result, the attacker can read, update, and remove tables in the databases. Through this, attackers might even obtain administrative rights.
How to avoid SQL injection Attack
Use an intrusion detection system, which is designed to identify unwanted network access.
Validate the information provided by the user. A validation procedure ensures that user input is correct.
- Distributed Denial-of-Service Attack
A Denial-of-Service Attack poses a considerable risk to businesses. In this scenario, attackers target systems, servers, or networks and flood them with traffic in order to deplete their resources and bandwidth.
When this happens, the servers become overburdened with incoming requests, causing the website it hosts to shut down or slow down. As a result, valid service inquiries go unanswered.
When attackers utilize numerous hacked systems to launch this attack, it is also known as a DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service) attack.
How to avoid DDoS attack:
To identify malicious traffic, perform a traffic analysis.
Recognize warning indicators such as network slowdowns, occasional website shutdowns, and so on. In such cases, the organization must take the essential procedures as soon as possible.
Create an incident response plan, create a checklist, and ensure that your staff and data center is prepared to manage a DDoS attack.
DDoS protection should be outsourced to cloud-based service providers.
- Insider Danger
An internal danger, as the name implies, involves an insider rather than a third party. In such a circumstance, it may be someone from within the organisation who knows everything about it. Insider threats have the ability to do enormous harm.
Insider threats are common in small firms since employees have access to many accounts containing sensitive information. There are numerous reasons for this type of attack, including avarice, malice, or even negligence. Insider dangers are difficult to forecast and thus difficult to manage.
How to avoid Insider Threat attack:
Organizations should have a strong security culture.
Companies must limit the IT resources that employees have access to based on their job duties.
Employees must be trained to detect insider threats. This will assist staff in recognising when a hacker has tampered with or is attempting to misuse the organization’s data.
- Cryptojacking
Cryptojacking is strongly associated with cryptocurrencies. Cryptojacking occurs when an attacker gains access to another person’s computer in order to mine cryptocurrency.
The attacker gains access by infecting a website or tricking the victim into clicking on a malicious link. For this, they also use internet adverts with JavaScript code. Victims are unaware of this because the Crypto mining code operates in the background; the only indication they may see is a delay in execution.
How to avoid Cryptojacking:
Cryptojacking can infect even the most vulnerable devices, so keep your software and security apps up to date.
Employees should receive Cryptojacking awareness training to assist them to spot Cryptojacking threats.
Install an ad blocker because advertisements are a common source of Cryptojacking scripts. Extensions such as Miner Block, which is used to identify and block crypto mining scripts, are also available.
- Zero-Day Exploitation
A Zero-Day Exploit occurs after the announcement of a network vulnerability; in most circumstances, there is no remedy for the issue. As a result, the vendor alerts consumers of the vulnerability; nevertheless, this information also reaches the attackers.
Depending on the vulnerability, the vendor or developer may take any amount of time to resolve the problem. Meanwhile, attackers are focusing on the exposed vulnerability. They ensure that the vulnerability is exploited even before a patch or solution is implemented.
How to avoid Zero-day exploits:
Patch management techniques should be effectively explained throughout organizations. To automate the procedures, use management solutions. As a result, deployment delays are avoided.
Prepare an incident response strategy to assist you in dealing with a cyberattack. Maintain a strategy cantered on zero-day attacks. The damage can thus be minimized or prevented entirely.
- Watering Hole Assault
The victim in this case is a specific group within an organisation, region, etc. In such an assault, the attacker targets websites that the targeted group frequently visits. Websites are discovered by either closely monitoring the group or guessing.
Following that, the attackers infiltrate these websites with malware, which infects the systems of the victims. In such an assault, the malware targets the user’s personal information. In this case, the hacker may also gain remote access to the infected machine.
How to avoid watering hole attack:
Update your software to limit the possibility of an attacker exploiting a vulnerability. Check for security fixes on a regular basis.
Watering hole attacks can be detected using network security techniques. When it comes to identifying such suspicious behaviours, intrusion prevention systems (IPS) perform admirably.
It is recommended that you disguise your internet activities to avoid a watering hole assault. Use a VPN and your browser’s private browsing function to accomplish this. A VPN provides a secure Internet connection to another network. It serves as a safeguard for your browsing behavior. NordVPN is a fantastic VPN example.
That was a list of the top 10 types of cyberattacks. Let us now take you through the following segment of our post on different forms of cyberattacks.
How Can Cyber Attacks Be Prevented?
Although we examined multiple methods for preventing the various forms of cyberattacks, let us recap and look at a few personal recommendations that you may use to avoid a cyberattack in general.
Change your passwords on a regular basis and use difficult-to-crack alphanumeric passwords. Avoid using overly complicated passwords that you might forget. Do not use the same password more than once.
Regularly update your operating system and programs. This is the first line of defense against any cyber attack. This will eliminate weaknesses that hackers frequently exploit. Use reputable and trusted anti-virus software.
Use a firewall as well as other network security solutions such as intrusion detection systems, access control, application security, and so on.
Open emails from unknown senders with caution. Examine the emails you receive for flaws and severe problems.
Use a VPN service. This ensures that the traffic between the VPN server and your device is encrypted.
Back up your data on a regular basis. Many security pros believe that having three copies of your data on two different media types and an additional copy in an off-site location is preferable (cloud storage). As a result, even during a cyber assault, you can erase your system’s data and restore it using a recently created backup.
Employees should understand cybersecurity fundamentals. They must be aware of the various sorts of cyberattacks and how to respond to them.
Authentication might be two-factor or multi-factor. To validate themselves, users must submit two distinct authentication factors with two-factor authentication. We call it multi-factor authentication when you are asked for more than two additional authentication methods in addition to your username and password. This is an important step in securing your account.
Secure your Wi-Fi networks and stay away from public Wi-Fi without a VPN.
Protect your mobile device, as it is a common target for cyberattacks. Install programs only from legitimate and trusted sources, and keep your smartphone up to date.
These are the recommendations you must follow in order to safeguard your systems and networks from a cyber assault.
Conclusion
You have learned everything there is to know about cyber attacks after reading this essay on the many types of cyberattacks. You learned about what a cyber attack is, the top 10 types of cyber assaults, and how to avoid one. With the growing amount of cybercrimes today, it is important to be aware of cyber threats and how to defend one’s network.
