In this tutorial you are going to learn about Physical Security and Malware which is an important part of Cyber Security. Physical Security focuses on protecting hardware and facilities from unauthorized access or damage, while Malware surrounds malicious software designed to disrupt, damage or gain unauthorized access to systems. Understanding these concepts is crucial for building a robust defense against cyber threats.
Physical Security
Well talking about physical security, we can state that the protection of all our personnel data including software hardware and all other network area from a severe loss and threat that could damage a particular agency or institution in a very prominent way.
Malware
Malware is termed as a Malicious software or a computer-executable malware. It is any piece of software that was written with the intent of damaging devices, stealing data, etc. It can be a program code too. The codes that are running without the consent of the user is called a malware.
Reasons why these attacks unknowingly increase day by day
The number of computer user on a daily basis is rapidly increasing and connectivity of these computers are now done with ease. Human beings are now primarily dependent on there laptops/computers and all crucial information are within it. These attacks are launched easily in an automated manner and thus there is a rapid increase in number of attacks.
Some people using bad or unsafe programming language that also is a major reason why these systems are easily extensible and hiding codes are very easy.
Types of Malware
There are various types of malware which include:- Viruses and worms
- Bots and Trojans
- Spyware and adware
- Back-doors and Dos, DDos attacks
Virus and Worms
Virus is a type of malicious code or program written to alter the way a computer operates and is designed to spread from one computer to another. It actually needs a host, example- word document or any file. Melissa virus is an example which uses address books from the infected computer (1999).
Worms are the oldest one in this category which we also state it as Morris worm. It usually propagates itself and are commonly used in BSD UNIX flaw.
Bots and Trojans
Bot is self-propagating malware designed to infect a host. These are usually made to infect multiple computers. A botnet is a collection of internet-connected devices infected by malware and then launch distributed denial of service (DDos) attacks.
On the other hand, Trojan is way by which a malware is secretly installed in the system that could be an adware or a key-logger. It sneaks inside the system and delivers probably a devastating payloads.
Spyware and Adware
Spyware are basically spawn which grew with the rapid growth of the internet. It does not spread like viruses instead it is packaged with user installed programs or software mostly by peer 2 peer (p2p) connection.
This leads to slow browsing of internet which include those annoying pop-ups and sluggish behaviour of your system.
Dangerous spyware generally tracks down our daily basis browsing habits and very crucial/sensitive information from user’s side.
Structure of a Virus
The faster the infection, the virus will be more unrecognizable by the system. When the infected program is opened it will run the virus code when invoked. A virus has the capability to compress any infected program and make its version identical lengths
Trojan Horse
Trojan Horse also basically performs another action that is way similar to as such viruses. It actually does not propagate itself in the form of self-replication but are usually encoded in hidden payload and are use in installations of back-doors.
Ransomware (New)
Very common ransomware that were globally roaming around includes WannaCry, troldesh, Locky, Bad Rabbit and Ryuk.
These are malicious code which directly targets victims data and blocks it access for the user. In order to unblock the crucial data the victim/user need to pay ransom to the attacker. A simple ransomware may include locking up the system. Advance type of ransomware uses cryptography techniques to block the data of the victim.
This tutorial on Physical Security and Malware is contributed by Raunak Kumar and modified by Rajnish Kumar. If you like TheCode11, then do follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.