What is a threat actor? Threat actors, also known as cyberthreat actors or malicious actors, are individuals or groups that intentionally cause harm to digital devices or systems. Threat actors exploit vulnerabilities in computer systems, networks and software to perpetuate various cyberattacks, ...
Although the term ‘threat actor’ is often used interchangeably with ‘hackers’, hackers and threat actors are not one and the same. Ahackeris someone who uses their computer skills to overcome a challenge or problem, for better or for worse, while threat actors almost always have malicious ...
Not every threat actor is a skilled attacker. Many scripts, code repositories and malware are freely downloadable for anyone to use. These threat actors are colloquially known as “script kiddies” since they usually don’t have the technical skills to code or exploit vulnerabilities. Even without...
and potentially sell stolen data on darknet markets. While insider threats could share this motivation, it’s more likely that an insider will unintentionally fall for a sophisticated phishing or social engineering attack. In the case of a malicious threat actor, a common goal is to harm the o...
A cyber or cybersecurity threat is a malicious act that seeks to damage data, steal data, or disrupt digital life in general. Cyber threats include computer viruses, data breaches, Denial of Service (DoS) attacks, and other attack vectors. Cyber threats also refer to the possibility of a su...
Keylogger injection.Akeyloggingprogram is injected into the user's system as malware to monitor and record each of the user's keystrokes. This enables the threat actor to steal personally identifiable information, login credentials and sensitive enterprise data. ...
Denial-of-service attacks (DoS):Occurs when legitimate users are unable to access information systems, devices, or other network resources due to the actions of amalicious cyber threat actor. Exploit:A piece of software, data or sequence of commands that takes advantage of avulnerabilityto cause...
Maybe you have no control over the next attack vector a bad actor will use, but you have control over your organization’s defense against it. As important as it is to understand attack vectors, it’s more important to understandendpoint security challengesand establish and maintain strongendpoin...
threat protection. Prior to joining CrowdStrike, Baker worked in technical roles at Tripwire and had co-founded startups in markets ranging from enterprise security solutions to mobile devices. He holds a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Washington and is now based in Boston, ...
phishing; spam is unsolicited, but it may contain a legitimate sales message, for example. Phishing directs the user to a harmful site with a malicious intent. In our example above, the site is developed to look just like the streaming or bank webpage, and it asks for sensitive ...