Cyber Security

Cyber Security

1. Key Terms

   • Attack
     • An attack is a deliberate action ,targeting an organisation's digital system or data
   • Cyber security
     • It refers to the range of measures that can be taken to protect computer systems
     • Networks and data from unauthorised access or cyber attack
   • Threat
     • A threat is an incident or an action witch is deliberate or unintended that results in disruption down time or data lost
       • Internal threat = caused by an incident inside an organisation
       • External threat = caused outside the organisation
   • Unauthorised access
     • This refers to someone gaining entry without permission to an organisation's system,software of data
       • This achieved by exploiting a security vulnerability
   • Trojan horse
     • Users are tricked into downloading it to their computer.Once installed the Trojan horse works under cover to carry out a out predetermined task
   • Rootkit
     • Designed to remotely access and control a computer system without being detected by security software or the user
   • ransomware
     • Encrypts files stored on a computer system without being detected by security software of the user
   • Spyware
     • Is secretly installed to collect information from someone else's computer
   • Key loggers
     • Spyware that records every Keystroke made on a computer to steal personal infomation
   • Adware
     • Automatically shows adverts such as pop ups
       • most adware is harmless but some contain spyware such as keyloggers
   • Botnet
     • Bots take control of a computer system,without the users knowledge.A botnet is a large collection of malware-infected devices(zombies)
       • An attacker(bot herder) chooses when to 'wake' the zombies to preform an attack
   • Distributed Denial -of-service attack (DDoS attack)
     • Flooding a website with useless traffic to inundate and overwhelm the network

2. Social engineering

   • It is a set of methods used by cyber criminals to deceive individuals into handling over information that they can use for fraudulent purposes
   • Shoulder surfing/shouldering
     • It involves the attacker watching the victim while they provide sensitive information
   • Phishing
     • Is an attack in witch the victim receives an email disguised to look as if it has come from a reputable data.The email usually provides a link to another website where the information can be imputted
   • Pharming
     • It is when a victim redirects the user from a genuine website to a fake website
       • Some pharming sites are so expertly copied from the genuine website that is very difficult to identity therefore this is carried out without the user knowing about it