Attack methods Part I

 

 

ATTACK METHODS ( Hacking Terminology)

 

Information security is as important as the information itself. In the complex world of web and interconnected networks, security is a major concern and only the proactive approach to secure our information can reduce/mitigate the risk posed by the advanced threats and attacks.

As the technology is growing so are the ways to attack the system/networks.. some popular attack methods to the systems/information are as below :

 

Virus :

Virus a piece of code or program which is pushed in our system by attacker without our knowledge and gets executed . Virus has the capability to replicate itself.The virus  can spread in the system in no time and can spread even across the network bypassing the security. Virus can be less or more harmful depends on the code. Its kind of malware which is attached to the files or programs and as the user runs the programs the virus infects the system.

 

Worms:

Worm is also a kind of virus but the only difference between virus and worms is that virus needs human action to run as they are attached to the files and programs but worms can run on its own and spread. They can travel independently from machine to machine, across the networks and cause severe damage to the applications/systems.

 

Trojan Horse :

Trojan horse could be a software or executable file which apparently looks useful and once we execute, it will install some malicious code in the system and send out the information across the network. It can open some ports in the system without the knowledge and wishes of the victim and open a backdoor for the attacker to gain unauthorised access compromising the information.

 

E-mail Spam:

Email spam is the situation where the target mailbox is filled by usually unsolicited mails resulting exceeding the mail quota and preventing the user to use the email services. it can be un intentional if any of the users sends a mail copying groups that contains hundreds of recipients. the situation aggravates when unaware recipients start replying to the mail creating flood or chain of mails consuming the bandwidth and introducing Denial of Service.

 Botnets:

A set of compromised computers which are called zombie computers although their owners are unaware of this, running software usually installed through worms, Trojan horse or backdoors. The 'Bot' has been taken from Robot and 'Net' has been derived from network. According to a report from Russian-based Kaspersky Labs, botnets -- not spam, viruses, or worms -- currently pose the biggest threat to the Internet.

 

Phishing:

The act of sending the fraud mails to users  falsely claiming from a legitimate source and then direct them to some fake website persuading the users to enter their confidential information like password, credit card details and bank account details. The purpose of phishing is to steal the valuable information of the users by befooling them. Phishers use a number of different social engineering and e-mail spoofing ploys to try to trick their victims.

 

War Dialing :

War Dialing is a situation where the attacker penetrates the system through dialing to the modem connected to the network. War dialer usually a freeware program, automatically dials a defined range of numbers to target the victim.

 

Brute Force Attack:

Brute force is also called exhaustive search, is a method where the attacker tries multiple combinations to crack the password or Data Encryption Standard keys using brute force) in an attempt to gain unauthorized access.  The approach is less intelligent but has good success though it is very time consuming.

 

Data Alternation attack:

Alternation attacks occur when someone makes unsolicited or unauthorized modifications to code or data, attacking its integrity. These attacks can occur in different forms and have a variety of consequences. An organization might have a Software Development Life Cycle, but the binary code can be altered. A person with access can recompile an existing program to add another library or DLL. The primary defense against an alteration attack is a cryptographic hash. If we can record the state of a program or data before it is altered and securely store the hash, you can periodically recheck the program or data and compare it with the stored hash. SHA 2 is recommended for the hash algorithm.

 

 Denial of Service attack:

Denial of Service attack happens when the attacker prevents the legitimate user accessing information or services. This is done either by targeting your computer or the computer or network/website you are accessing. The attacker can prevent the users to use email or website or banking accounts. The attacker can use several methods to do this, for example, ping flood to exhaust the bandwidth or spam flood exceeding your mail quota resulting in DoS or phlashing where the damage is done to the extent of replacement of hardware.

Brute force attack, Banana attack, Pulsing zombie and bandwidth saturating attacking are example of application level DoS attack.

 

 Distributed Denial of Service attack:

Distributed Denial of Services attack happens when attacker used multiple computers to flood the victim network or computer in order to prevent him accessing information or services.

to be continued....