List of Most Common Types of Cyber Attacks

List of Most Common Types of Cyber Attacks

This article will take you through the list of the most common types of cyber attacks. Also, find What is a cyber attack, different types of cyberattacks, how a cyber attack happens, etc.

What is Cyber-attack?

Cyber Attack is an illegal act where the machine is used as a weapon or as a target. Cyber Fraud is a fast-growing area of fraud these days.

In India, the rate of cybercrime incidence is also rising day by day. The key emphasis in this article is on what cybercrime means, different forms of cybercrime, etc.

From the last couple of years, cybercrime has risen as people seek to take advantage of insecure business systems.

Attackers also demand ransom which ends up with more losses.

How a Cyber-Attack happens?

Numerous cyber threats are continuing, with hackers finding and manipulating weaknesses in the computer network.

This includes finding faults in the code of a website that allow them to insert their code and then bypass security or authentication processes easily.

Cyber Attack started to take off as soon as the media came into existence.

People started putting their data into the database and that created the risk of ID theft.

Related Post:- Importance of cyber security

7 Most Common Types of Cyber Attack

To achieve certain objectives of getting access or preventing operations, cyber-criminals are implementing a range of different technological methods.

New approaches still continue and some of these types of cyber attacks are as follows –

Malware

Malware is a word that describes threats, such as spyware, ransomware, viruses. Malware breaks a network through a flaw, usually when a user clicks a hazardous connection or email attachment which installs unsafe software later on.

Malware can do the following actions, once it is within the system –

• Access to key components of the network gets blocked.
• Installs harmful software
• Obtains data secretly by transferring data from the computer.

Phishing

Phishing is an activity of transmitting fake messages, typically via email, which appears to come from a trustworthy source.

The intention is to obtain confidential data such as credit card details and account information or install malware on the attacker’s computer.

Phishing is a cyber-threat that is increasingly widespread.

Man-in-the-middle

Man-in-the-middle (MitM) normally occurs when attackers inject themselves into some kind of two-party transaction, also known as eavesdropping attacks.

When traffic is disrupted by the attackers they can process and steal information.

Two increasing access sources for attacks at MitM are:

• Attackers may insert themselves on unsafe public Wi-Fi between a visitor’s computer and the network. The visitor transfers all of the details to the attacker without realizing it.
• Once a computer has been breached by malware, an intruder can encrypt files to process all the information about the user.

Denial-of-service attack

A denial-of-service attack is used to stop the online services from working properly.

Attackers send traffic systems, servers, or networks to drain the assets and resources.

As a result, the program can not satisfy valid demands. Additionally, hackers might use several breached machines to initiate the attack.

SQL Injection

SQL injection is a way of leveraging a bug by an attacker to gain control of the attacker’s database.

Most databases are built to follow commands coded in the Structured Query Language (SQL), and several sites also send data to SQL databases taking information through users.

For example, in a SQL injection method, an intruder may write some SQL commands into a web page that requests contact details of the person and if the website and database are not coded properly, the database may attempt to perform those instructions, gaining attackers the details they require.

Zero-day Exploit

After a flaw in the network has been revealed, a zero-day attack hits but before a fix or workaround is introduced. Intruders aim at the weakness that was revealed during such a time window.

Zero-day identification of vulnerability threats requires continuous vigilance.

DNS Tunneling

DNS tunneling uses the DNS protocol to transmit traffic. It sends traffic over DNS to HTTP and other protocols.

There are numerous, legal reasons for using DNS tunneling.

There are also fraudulent motives for using DNS Tunneling and VPN services. However, DNS requests are exploited for malicious use to decrypt data from a compromised network to the infrastructure of the attacker.

This can also be used from the attacker’s network to a vulnerable device for command and control callbacks.

Examples of Cyber-attack

Cyber-security history began in the 1970s. Words like malware, spyware, bugs, worms and logic bombs didn’t exist at that time.

Today, however, the exponential growth of cyber-attacks has forced these terms to make their way into daily news reports. For any company, cyber-security is now a priority.

Some of the recent notable cyber-attacks were as follows –

• WannaCry– WannaCry had a ransomware attack in 2017. Like all ransomware, it stole over infected machines and encoded their hard drive contents, then requested payment in Bitcoin for decryption. The malware has taken on a particular root in computers at institutions operated by the NHS of the UK.
• The Weather Channel  – Weather channel has fallen as a victim of ransomware infection. The intrusion revealed that the distinction between “television” and “the internet” has been somewhat eliminated, as any television activity such as the Weather Channel would depend entirely on web-based services for activity.
• Although the entire world is concentrating on the global threat presented by COVID-19, cyber-criminals around the world are inevitably preparing to profit on the situation by releasing a unique sort of “virus.” More and more professionals operate remotely every day, that eventually they face the prospect of working with little or no on-site IT staff and other critical support services. Against this context, both employers and workers need to take the utmost care in protecting themselves and sensitive information about the company.

Conclusion –

A cyber-attack is avoidable. Although there are increasing incidences of cyber-attacks, data shows that 99 percent of businesses are not being effectively secured. A hacker is always preventable.

The secret to cyber protection is a multilayered, end-to-end information security infrastructure that encompasses all networks, endpoints and mobile devices, and cloud.

This helps us to connect events through all network, cloud, and mobile technology environments.

We all know it’s hard to identify hackers or internet offenders because they use computers in one country and exploit machines in another.

The best approach to prevent the abovementioned listed most common types of cyber attacks is to be vigilant and alert.

Web users should use unique passwords, install anti-virus software, check suspicious emails and do not accept programs of this kind from unknown senders.

Sahana

Hi ! I am Sahana Pai having vast experience in Software industry.I love writing and can go on for hours together. Content writing has always been my passion and i love doing it. My Hobby includes travelling blogging and cooking.I have travelled across India and Europe.My family includes my husband and a little princess.