4 basic security facts everyone should know

The bad news: It's you against an army of cyber criminals around the world. The good news: A little knowledge can provide an effective defense

1. Two starting points lead to the vast majority of attacks

Unpatched software provides the main entry point of entry for hackers or malware, in part because very few computers have the latest updates for every commonly hacked program. The victim surfs to a web page or opens an email, and their computer is instantly, silently compromised. The second-most-common attack method: The user gets tricked into installing a Trojan. Together, these two methods account for almost all successful hacks.

Sure, there are hundreds of other methods: SQL injection attacks, password guessing, and so on. But nearly everything besides unpatched software and downloaded Trojans is statistical noise. In fact, if you fix the main two issues, you almost don’t need to do anything else. 

2. Trojans make up the biggest proportion of malware

Most malware can be broken down into viruses, worms, Trojans, or hybrids that combine features of two or more of those. Viruses spread by infecting other host files, which when run or accessed, fire off the malware program. Worms, once executed, are self-replicating; they don’t need someone to do anything once they are started.

Trojans don’t spread themselves. They rely upon each victim to execute the malicious program. The originating hacker must spread each and every copy to each victim separately, usually via email.

Why is this important? Well, unless the Trojan is ransomware, Trojans are easier to remove than the other malware types. Years ago most malware programs were viruses, and getting rid of them meant removing the virus from each infected host and trying to put back the legitimate program back to its original state. It was a hard to impossible task, and it significantly complicated removal and cleaning.

These days, because most malware programs are Trojans -- as long as they aren’t ransomware that hasn’t already locked up your computer -- you can identify the malicious programs and remove them (although Trojans may contain self-protection techniques to hamper removal). Still, there isn’t a malware removal pro or program that doesn’t mind messing with Trojans as compared to the other types of malware.

3. Most people give away their logon credentials

A significant percentage of users give their legitimate logon credentials to hackers every year. Typically this happens because the user is sent a phishing email that claims to be from the legitimate website asking for credentials -- or the user will lose the service.

Never give your logon credentials in response to an email request. When in doubt, go directly to the legitimate website and see what it tells you to do. Trust the website, not the email.

4. Antivirus programs are a necessary evil

Longtime readers know I don’t put a lot of faith in antimalware programs. Hackers create millions of new malicious programs each month, and signature-based antimalware can’t keep up.

That doesn’t mean people should disable or uninstall their antivirus program. They may not be 100 percent accurate, but they catch some malware, and for that alone, most computers should have one installed. 

Source: InfoWorld