A Guide to Understand and Audit Cyber Security in E-Commerce
The world is changing largely in the post-pandemic era, and consumers have largely changed their buying patterns and habits. There is no better time than this to start and establish an e-commerce business.
According to a study on the latest trends in e-commerce, this sector has witnessed a 279% growth in sales volume worldwide, & is expected to yield nearly 4.5 trillion dollars in 2021.
However, alongside this huge opportunity, there are also many risks in e-commerce for the industry giants and startups alike. The No.1 challenge you need to tackle while running an e-commerce business is cybersecurity threats ranging from malware to social engineering, which mandates security of the e-commerce platforms optimally than ever before. Let us explore how this can be achieved.
Cybersecurity in e-commerce
In the brick-and-mortar stores, the security measures were largely focused on the physical assets only as there existed no scope of any digital side challenges. On the other hand, in e-commerce, along with the need to consider physical security, the need for cybersecurity is far more important. As all the transactions are conducted online, the security must be focused on this specific area.
In this guide, we will try to break down the conceptual understanding of cybersecurity in e-commerce further for a better understanding. For this, we will first explore the biggest challenges e-commerce now faces in cybersecurity, and we will try to break it down further to discuss the measures to mitigate such risks.
Threats in e-commerce security
The major threat related to cybersecurity in the e-commerce industry are:
– Corrosive attacks like usage of malware etc.
– Information interception.
– Service disruption like DDoS attacks
– Social engineering like phishing and so on.
We can find that the ways attackers use to harm your e-commerce business or to steal your data vary. However, all these are intended to similar end goals of compromising your digital assets. Often, cybercriminals may try to leverage various forms of attacks combined and run these simultaneously. Let us see how to tackle these cybersecurity threats.
Corrosion attacks – viruses and malware
This is the case of using malicious software to damage your enterprise computers, network, and business IT assets. E-commerce is not the only victim here, but various types of malware pose different types of threats to computers and users across the spectrum. Some of the possible forms of this attack are:
– Viruses and worms
– Ransomware
– Backdoors
– Rootkits and evasion
Considering malware as one of the biggest threats in e-com cybersecurity, it is essential to use all essential malware protection. It is also advised to use a highly functional firewall to offer an additional layer of protection. For performance tuning of databases for optimum security, you can rely on RemoteDBA.com services.
Info interception
In this approach, a hacker may try to intercept the information through interception. They use bots to pose as individuals and try to collect data and parse nuggets of info. One mostly adopted way to do it is through skimming. In this, hackers try to pull the info entered by customers on web interfaces which they trust. Hackers try to spoof web pages by putting decoys that intercept the data in real-time.
Another interception approach involves a “man in the middle,” or shortly called MITM. In this model of attack, the hackers may intervene in the mail or other modes of communication to dupe both parties to think that they communicate with each other. The hacker steals sensitive information this way.
To prevent the scope of interception, all the sites and communications should be made secured and verified. The personnel involved and clientele should be oriented about this, and they should not communicate any sensitive information without enough caution.
DDoS Disruption
DDoS or Distributed Denial of Service is a very complex form of cyberattack, in which the hackers overwhelm your systems, and you will be unable to operate it further. It is similar to ransomware, where they further ask for payment to return it for your access. There are many ways to initiate a DDoS attack. However, the procedure mostly remains the same.
Social Engineering
Phishing and Spear attacks come under this category. These are a well-coordinated approach to convince the people to communicate with someone genuine to extract information. Phishing is a notorious social engineering cyberattack, which had been existing for a long. We can see a real-time example of the same as the ‘Nigerian prince scam,’ which exists since the 1980s.
There are two types of phishing attacks:
– Generalized phishing, which is sending emails on a large scale to a random population. The attackers may pretend to be a celebrity asking for some help to induce empathy in the readers and lead them to fall prey to phishing.
– Spear phishing – these are targeted attacks by aiming at one person or a small group by pretending to be someone who is known to them. These types of targeted attacks are also known as whaling.
Social engineering attacks tend to take advantage of the underdeveloped literacy of the public in cybersecurity. The best way to tackle this is to provide intensive training to the users and staff of your business. You need to try and teach your internal personnel and clientele also about the tell-tale signs of such attacks and ways to counteract the same.
Some handy solutions to e-commerce cybersecurity threats
Here is a quick list of the solutions that will help you prevent cybersecurity threats and help you respond to or recover.
– Strong first-line defenses with antivirus software, malware protection, and firewalls, etc.
– Strong policy on access control and password management.
– Penetration testing to identify the potential vulnerabilities.
– Security measures for your team like secure data storage and sharing solutions, VPNs such as CyberGhost or NordVPN, collaboration channels, etc.
– Overall threat management with all-inclusive packages.
The threat and vulnerability prevention do not only include the above, but it is essential to audit your e-commerce system and integrate a comprehensive cybersecurity infrastructure into it. You may also try to assist cybersecurity experts in working closely with the in-house team and making incident management a part of your cybersecurity framework.