Cyber Security: The Beginners Guide to Learning The Basics of Information Security and Modern Cyber Threats by Zhang Noah

Author:Zhang, Noah [Zhang, Noah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-09-28T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 4: Preventing Cyber Attacks

In September 2014, Home Depot announced that it was hacked, probably during the spring of that year; this hack led to the theft of the credit card information of 56 million customers. The hack began when malware masquerading as antivirus software infected the POS systems of the company's stores. The company had to pay nearly twenty million dollars in damages and identity theft protection services to those whose information had been compromised.

In February 2015, the largest security breach in healthcare history occurred when a group of cyber criminals, allegedly sponsored by a foreign government, hacked into the Anthem Health Insurance website. The attack led to millions of names, addresses, dates of birth, and the personal health information of individuals insured by Anthem to become compromised. The breach began when an Anthem employee opened up a phishing email; that one email led to well over one hundred million dollars in damages.

In the fall of 2016, while Yahoo was in negotiations to sell itself to the company Verizon, it disclosed that back in 2014, it had been hacked. 500 million email addresses, real names, dates of birth, and other sensitive information that can lead to identity theft had all been hacked. In the early winter of 2016, it disclosed that it had also been similarly hacked back in 2013. This security breach led to compromising the information of one billion users. Yahoo lost $350 million in its sell price to Verizon, as well as its good name. There have been many more, many of which have not been in the news, since then.

The above information isn't intended to scare you. It's intended to sober you into understanding the importance of cybersecurity and protecting yourself online. You may be thinking that these are major companies, so of course, they will be targeted by hackers. But consider this: companies like Yahoo and Target spend millions and millions of dollars every year in cybersecurity yet were still susceptible to security breaches by hackers.

Cybersecurity defends computers, programs and data against hard drive crashes, hackers, viruses, direct attacks and other situations that interrupt or destroy the flow of computer work and safety. Companies, organizations and government agencies receive and process volumes of confidential information, then store and transmit that data to other computers. Ever-increasing cyber-attacks at even the highest levels (The Pentagon, e.g.) demonstrate the need for the development of cybersecurity plans to ensure business flow, protect personal confidentiality and safeguard national security.

Basic measures of protection include maintaining strong authentication practices (passwords, etc.) and not storing sensitive data where it is openly accessible, but a strong cybersecurity plan must also take into account that the digital world expands continually. The cloud, the use of personal devices at work, the growing internet of things (IoT, the inter-connection of home appliances, autos, digital devices, power plants and more)—all of these have created a need to keep up with progress, or even stay a step ahead of it.

The following areas of cybersecurity are key to the development of a strong strategy of protection.

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