What do hackers want? Survey reveals their favorite targets
September 7, 2010 by Sam NarisiPosted in: Security, Special Report
What do cybercriminals love to see when they try to break into an organizations network? A recent survey reveals what vulnerabilities they look to exploit first.
The top security hole hackers look for: poorly configured networks.
That’s the conclusion of a recent survey conducted by Tufin Technologies at Def Con 18, the annual hackers’ convention held last month in Las Vegas.
According to the poll, 73% of data breaches are cause by bad network configurations, which 76% of the hackers in attendance said was the easiest security vulnerability to exploit.
What’s behind all those bad configurations? The main cause: IT staffer’s don’t know what to look for when monitoring and testing their networks, said 58% of the survey’s respondents. Also, many companies don’t have enough time or money for adequate security audits, according to 18% of hackers, and 11% said threats change too fast for many organizations to properly address them.
Another preferred method of gaining network access: having a user or IT staffer within the company as an ally, said 43% of the survey’s respondents.
That finding lines up with those of a recent Verizon survey, which recently published its own study on data breaches. The communications giant found that in 2009, 48% of data breaches involved insiders — that was up from 22% in 2008.
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Tags: data breaches, Def Con, hackers, network configuration, Tufin Technologies
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