Anatomy of a Hack Disrupted

How one of SIEM’s out-of-the-box rules caught an intrusion and beyond

Blog by Randy Smith

Every year, organizations spend millions of frustrating hours and countless sums of money trying to reverse the damage done by malware attacks. The harm caused by malware can be astronomical, going well beyond intellectual property loss and huge fines levied for non-compliance. In 2014, the cost of malware attacks and resulting breaches was estimated at $491 billion. And these costs include more than just the money spent trying to directly respond to security breaches. Productivity, long-term profitability, and brand reputation are often severely impacted as well.

The malware threat is growing larger and becoming more challenging to respond to every year. It seems like every month there are more major breaches. Target, Neiman Marcus, and UPS have all been victims of costly breaches in the past couple years, with each event showing signs that the breaches could have been prevented. Phishing-based malware was the starting point 95 percent of the time in state-sponsored attacks, and 67 percent of the time in cyber-espionage attacks.

Can it happen to you?

It’s easy to shrug off the threat of malware and believe that the target will always be a retail organization or a huge brand name, that it will never be your organization. However, according to a 2015 Ponemon study, 80 percent of all organizations experience some form of Web-borne malware.  So don’t be lulled into a false sense of security: All industries are at risk, including the financial, health care, and government sectors you hear about in the news.

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