Different Types of Malware Every Small Business Should Know

Malware attacks cost companies money and customers and damage their reputations in the long term. Major companies spend millions to recover, while small businesses lack the time, technical expertise, or other resources to bounce back from an attack. But there is good news! You can prevent such attacks by understanding who you're up against first.

In this article, we'll explore several types of malware and the symptoms of each that threaten today's web users. Our goal is to provide small business owners with an understanding of cybersecurity fundamentals and equip them with heightened confidence. 

Malware is a term used to describe all programs specifically intended to damage a computer, network or website. As an information security specialist, you should be aware of the five major types of malware.

Defacements

This type of attack is relatively common (in the second quarter of 2018 alone, defacements made up 14 percent of all malware attacks) and easy to spot. In a defacement attack, cybercriminals replace your site's content, like your homepage, with their images. You can think of defacement like graffiti for your website. The replacement content may be humorous, shocking, or ideological. If visitors land on your site and see it's been defaced, they may lose trust and leave. Revenue could be temporarily slowed or halted, but only if they don't have HTTPS installed!

Backdoors

The backdoor is one of how a cybercriminal will take control of your site. Once they have access to a website, there is not much that can be done to stop them. A security breach is imminent if a positive influence on new updates and security patches are not continuously updated. Backdoor attacks are becoming increasingly harder to detect, with close to 80% found at this writing, including such malicious additions as "New Document" or "Readme" files or even legitimate files simply modified by hackers to allow impenetrable access.

SEO Spam

SEO refers to the way you optimize your content for search engines. SEO encompasses several best practices for using keywords throughout your web copy, the development of online brand recognition, and the acquisition and maintenance of backlinks from authoritative websites to yours. If you notice an influx of traffic coming from highly suspicious or irrelevant search engines and see unnatural links or comments being posted on your site, this could be SEO spam at work. This can dump hundreds of thousands of files filled with malicious shortcuts to manipulate rank, which will lead to a drastic decline in traffic very quickly. 

Redirects

Web surfers are instinctively suspicious of online advertisements. So when something pops up out of nowhere, links to 'redirected' web pages start getting clicked instead. That's because malicious redirects don't just steal your clicks; they also degrade website performance and earn an advertiser less money!

In the end, Take some essential cybersecurity best practices into account. For instance, maintain strong, unique passwords and not reuse them on multiple sites. Also, use a CAPTCHA — a small test that distinguishes humans from robots — to protect login forms and other forms on your website. Finally, get familiar with your website's file structure, review it periodically to make sure everything is in order, and always back up your files so you can restore them in the event of a breach. However, a backup is only effective if it's a clean backup of your website — a malware-infected backup will be ineffective.

Malware is a challenge for businesses — but that's why we're here! We know how important it is for you to protect your business from malware, so we've compiled a comprehensive list of malware prevention tips. In addition, if you are looking for website malware removal or other services like WordPress hack cleanup, you should visit our website.

Source URL : https://www.securitpress.io/site-cleanup