Analysis of Web Attacks and Computer Security Threats Report

This report provides an analysis of web attacks, focusing on their significance in computer security. It defines web attacks, categorizes them (FormJacking, CryptoJacking, Ransomware), and highlights their increasing prevalence with data from the Symantec Internet Security Threat Report. The report explains how web attacks target individuals, businesses, and governments through methods like DoS/DDoS, MitM, and phishing, detailing the impact of these attacks. It emphasizes the importance of prioritizing web attack issues for CIOs, discussing the potential for financial, informational, and reputational damage. The report references scholarly sources to support its findings, providing a comprehensive overview of the current web security landscape.

Running head: COMPUTER SECURITY
COMPUTER SECURITY
Name of the Student
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Author Note

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Question 1:
 The toolkits of web-attack are a type of software program which is designed and coded to
analyse the target’s computing appliances in the interest to find out the security
vulnerabilities and potholes automatically so that the hacker gets a path to gain access of
the target’s machine. Depending upon the working principle, design structure web-attacks
could be categorized into some types-
 FormJacking: The attacker uses malicious code of JavaScript, in the aim of obtain
credit card details and other payment related information from eCommerce sites.
 CryptoJacking: The criminals run a code for mining cryptocurrency without the
acknowledgement of the victims.
 Ransomware: The hacker uses a malware derived from cryptovirology, which
threaten the target about his personal data to publish, or can block the victim from
accessing his machine. There are several types of ransomware, like- WannaCry,
CopyCat, Petya, Ryuk, and Crysis.
 For the leaps and bounce increase of internet dependency and incident of hacking
happened in this scope on last few years gives a clear image about the importance of
computer security now-a-day. In 2018, at least 1 out of 10 URLs was reported as
malicious, the web attacks were also 56percent extra than the last year where it was 1 out
of 16. On December, 18 Symantec reported a blocking of 1.3 million web attacks, per-
day. FormJacking started effecting about 4800 websites on every month of 2018 and 3.7
million FormJacking was blocked by Symantec this year, among which about 30percent
happened in the last quarter (Symantec.com. 2019). The nature of IoTs and internet
objects of being prone to this web-attacks and the huge loss of identity and information
reported, explains the importance of computer security precisely with evidence.

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Question 2:
 The hackers try to identify the vulnerabilities like flaws in website coding- to modify it
with their own code to bypass the security or authentication problem (Goutam 2015). The
attack could be achieved by using many ways some of them are mentioned bellow.
I. DoS/DDoS; Attacker releases huge amount of data in the server in order to
crash down the system so that victim loses his control over the system.
II. MitM: Hacker 1st receives data from the sender acknowledge it and then send
it to the target receiver, which leads into a huge identity and data piracy.
III. Phishing: Hacker sends a spam mail that looks like renowned organization
clicking which victim could even give the full access of his machine to the
hacker.
There are many other attacks like drive-by, password, SQL injection, XSS, and Malware.
 CIO of a company takes care of the traditional IT and commutation process which works
in the aim to achieve an enterprise’s goal.
At present companies are deeply rooted in the internet, smart devices, IoT, and the
dependency makes the company prone to get attacked in core infrastructure by the hacker
which leads into the monitory, information, fame and even the asset loss for the company
(Alsharnouby, Alaca and Chiasson 2015). As the multinational companies mainly depend
upon the ERP system to keep integrity in the company process and keep their management
process in flow, malware like ransomware could disrupt their automated or business process
by shutting down the machine or breaking the link.

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To deal with such problems and mark the organization safe from those potential
vulnerabilities and threats, CIO should prioritize web attacks issues and probable cause with a
possible solution in his to do list.

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References:
Abomhara, M., 2015. Cyber security and the internet of things: vulnerabilities, threats,
intruders and attacks. Journal of Cyber Security and Mobility, 4(1), pp.65-88.
Alsharnouby, M., Alaca, F. and Chiasson, S., 2015. Why phishing still works: User strategies
for combating phishing attacks. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 82,
pp.69-82.
Ben-Asher, N. and Gonzalez, C., 2015. Effects of cyber security knowledge on attack
detection. Computers in Human Behavior, 48, pp.51-61.
Goutam, R.K., 2015. Importance of cyber security. International Journal of Computer
Applications, 111(7).
Symantec.com. (2019). [online] Available at:
https://www.symantec.com/content/dam/symantec/docs/reports/istr-24-2019-en.pdf