Protecting Against Botnet Attacks
A botnet is a network of infected devices that act together to carry out an attack. Hackers infect systems with malware, then use those infected systems to perform automated attacks. While they are often used to steal data from systems, these networks can also be a vector for large-scale attacks such as denial of service (DoS), spam, and other targeted attacks.
When hackers infect machines with bot malware, the hacker collects information and sends it to a remote server that controls the group of compromised devices. These servers are known as Command and Control (C&C) servers. The C&C servers communicate with the bot software running on each machine to obtain instructions. The commands instruct the bots to perform malicious tasks.
The bots can run programs that breach web accounts by using brute force or dictionary attacks, which attempt to guess passwords with a range of combinations. The bots can also be used to harvest keystrokes and take screenshots of users’ screens in order to gather sensitive data. The scale of a botnet allows it to perform attacks that are much harder for security solutions to stop, including DDoS, ransomware, and phishing scams.
The easiest way to protect against botnets is to install anti-virus software on all your devices and regularly update them. You should also block communication channels that are used by bots to connect to their C&C servers. However, as methods to thwart cybercriminals evolve, they will find ways around these measures, so it’s important to constantly monitor your network and devices for signs of bot activity.