Page 50 - Cyber Warnings

Visualize the Cyber Arms Race. What Does a Hack Attack Really

Look Like?

By, Todd Helfrich, Director of Federal, ThreatStream

When you hear the phrase “cyber warfare,” do you envision a lone figure hunched over a
flickering monitor in a dark corner? Or perhaps a sleek control room staffed by nefarious
characters, executing orders issued by a despotic computer genius?

Now, using ThreatStream Lab’s Modern Honey Network (MHN), cyber investigators can watch
actual cyber-attacks as they happen. Not the criminals behind the keystrokes, but the real-time
cyber events that happen inside and outside of a system when it is being assaulted.

ThreatStream’s honeypots are disguised as vulnerable servers, laptops or networks. The
devices act as lures to attract attacks, so cybersecurity experts can study the techniques
hackers use to breach cyber information systems.

Honeypots are not a new weapon in the cyber arms race. But MHN makes it easier than ever to
deploy and maintain decoys, and it automates the incorporation of collected threat intelligence
into cybersecurity tools. Installation and management of honeypots is streamlined. Setting up
data flows, analyzing collected data and making it actionable is simplified.

Just as hackers learn from defensive measures, revealing how the bad guys operate enhances
cybersecurity protections. Let’s take a trip to the dark side, and see a honeypot in action.

Like Bees to Honey, the Buzz Is Almost Instant

Using MHN is no different from the interfaces IT consumers have come to expect from cloud-
based applications. Once inside, a cyber assault is just a few mouse clicks and a screen refresh
away.

50 Cyber Warnings E-Magazine – March 2016 Edition
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