Criminals don’t play by the rules

There are all sorts of measures you can take to prevent hackers from gaining access to your system. These are sometimes complicated procedures. For example, there is a security structure, in which modifying protected data can only be done with the permission of two independent system administrators. They can separately notify a third person, who then gives the key to be able to change data. Super safe. But the procedure does assume that a cybercriminal is trying to crack these steps. Unfortunately, this is not how criminals operate.

Three locks on your front door

It’s like securing your front door with highly sophisticated laser security, three locks and facial recognition. A thief who wants to get in will usually leave that front door unlocked. He enters through the open basement window. That’s how cybercriminals do it, too. They often have access to the underlying layer and do not need to bypass the complex security. In fact, they are already behind it. The same goes for the idea that ransomware gives the encrypted files the extension .enc (from encrypted). Again, it is a front-door protection (which we indeed encountered recently) to prohibit the system from creating this extension. That might indeed prevent files from being encrypted, were it not for the fact that hackers can give files any extension they want. Thus, a very thin security method.

Unwarranted sense of security

Complex security or not: there is real danger and the heavy security gives an unwarranted sense of security. So you have to take measures that do help and be or become aware that criminals are simply not neat people trying to get through the front door. For example, employing an ethical hacker can be a great idea to find out where the real security weaknesses are.

Safe storage

These points of awareness can help to really take the security of your system to the next level. Storing data securely is an essential part of that, and we at Comex know all about that. Please inquire about our options!