Understand types of attacks and threat landscape
Cyberattacks, as previously defined, are attacks that try to gain illegal access to a computer system or device to cause harm. Many types of cyberattacks happen in the world today. Each year, cybercriminals find ways to introduce new types of attacks to the threat landscape.
Some of the most common types of cyberattacks are:
- Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) – Attackers target systems, servers, or networks and flood them with traffic that exhausts a network’s resources or bandwidth. DDoS attacks often result in system-wide crashes so legitimate end users can’t access normal systems or network resources. Examples of DDoS attacks are files that take too long to open and websites that take too long to load or don’t load at all.
- Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) – A MITM attack is sometimes referred to as an eavesdropping attack. In this type of attack, the cybercriminal hijacks or comes between a client and host in the network to steal and manipulate data.
- Ransomware – Ransomware attacks are serious because company or user data or resources are held hostage by cybercriminals who demand money with the promise of regaining access. Paying the ransom doesn’t ensure full return or restoration of data or resources.
- Phishing – Phishing is a type of attack that uses email or websites to ask for personal information from individuals. Phishing email messages and websites can look legitimate and often pretend to come from legitimate sources. Cybercriminals prey on human weaknesses to obtain private information that is then exploited to steal information or resources.
- Vishing – Vishing is similar to phishing but is an attack that uses voice communications to deceive victims. Cybercriminals pretend to be from legitimate organizations encouraging victims to verify account or security information. This method is unlikely to lead to a ransomware attack but is commonly used to trick people into revealing bank account information to steal funds.
- Smishing – Similar to phishing and vishing, smishing uses SMS (text messages) to exploit victims. The messages contain links to fraudulent sites imitating legitimate sites.
- Password attacks – Password attacks occur when a cybercriminal uses a password cracking tool to hack a password. The cybercriminal then uses the password to sign into systems to steal information.
- Malware attacks – Malware attacks are some of the most common types of cyberattacks. Malware is malicious software used to breach a network through some type of vulnerability. Spyware falls into this category.