A botnet refers to a network of interconnected malicious bots that are controlled remotely by a bot master. They have kept individual users and organizations on their toes for decades by instigating massive data theft, click frauds, DDoS attacks, and spamming campaigns. Botnets are also involved in stealth crypto mining and extortion strategies. Because they intelligently mimic human behavior, many people do not suspect that they have been plagued by botnets that are quietly conducting nefarious acts controlled by malicious actors.
Botnet activity causes an increase in CPU load, making the server heat and a spike in web traffic which are the only red flags in most cases of a botnet attack. The average user can not notice such activity. Because of their sophistication, the botnets are invisible to major security solutions, like antiviruses.
Why do You Need Botnet Protection?
There are various reasons for protecting your website from botnets. By instituting a protection solution, you effectively ensure that your online presence is shielded from these malicious actors. Below are the reasons you need to protect your online infrastructure from botnets.
To Protect Yourself From DDoS Attacks
The number of DDoS attacks increased by 35% in the third quarter of 2017. If a DDoS attack can be successful, it can have a devastating effect on your organization. Understanding how to respond swiftly to DDoS attacks can be the difference between your organization going out of business or thriving. It can make your organization offline and effectively stop any interactions with your customers. DDoS attacks affect even large corporations, including Amazon and PlayStation. In a DDoS attack, cybercriminals send lots of traffic to a web server making it overwhelmed. They prevent incoming traffic from contacting the Web server, rendering the website unavailable. The malicious actors may use networks of automated scripts called botnets to carry out a large-scale distributed attack.
To Block Bot Traffic
Botnets can generate a good deal of traffic and bombard your website with it. The traffic comes from various distributed sources. Since many businesses rely on the traffic to determine the direction of their KPIs and for decision making, the traffic must be devoid of any bot traffic. Deciding based on incorrect data can have devastating effects on the business.
So, now that we have seen why we need botnet protection, what are the various methods that we can employ to be safe from these malicious actors?
Techniques for bot protection
Conducting regular updates
Ensure that you keep your OS, Software, and other applications up to date. They prevent your online infrastructure from being turned into a botnet by the cybercriminal. Regularly install the security patches and fixes to software and applications immediately they arise. Otherwise, you are risking the cybercriminals exploiting the unpatched vulnerabilities.
Enlisting a comprehensive botnet protection mechanism
Theoretically, it is more effective to identify the bots and block their commands from command-and-control center servers. Sometimes, it is complicated and impossible to do. A botnet solution taps between the bot and command-and-control center to effectively identify command-and-control center servers. This is possible only if you dedicate the solution to protecting the command-and-control center itself. Using a botnet protection solution, you can monitor and block the botnet attacks, though signature-based detection’s effectiveness is no longer guaranteed. Therefore, they yield a high number of false positives. To differentiate between harmless, legitimate traffic and malicious bot traffic, you need to implement the right technology. A botnet detection solution like DataDome can analyze all incoming requests to your website and simultaneously use machine learning and artificial intelligence techniques for determining if the traffic is legit or malicious.
Take up measures to prevent phishing
Attackers use phishing attacks to target your website or online infrastructure and turn it into a botnet. Therefore, educating your employees and staff on various indicators of a phishing attack and how they can avoid them. You should avoid clicking on links and attachments in an email whose source is unknown and sent from a suspicious sender. Call the company’s hotline or a phone number associated with the request, if you are not sure about who the sender of the email is and it appears legitimate.
Using an antivirus solution
Botnets are morphed from malware infections. Therefore, it is crucial to invest in anti-malware or antivirus solutions that are adequate. Install a web application firewall to keep the bot requests away from your website.
Avoid downloading content from p2p torrents and file-sharing networks
Peer-to-Peer networks such as torrent sites and site sharing networks are ripe with bot traffic. The hackers attach malware and bots to the videos, documents, and software applications. When a user downloads the content, the malware is downloaded stealthily to their devices. Unfortunately, if the device is a web server, this can have a devastating effect on the customer data and personal information. Using amplification techniques, the severity of botnet attacks can proliferate. Therefore, it is essential to avoid downloading content from torrent sites.
Using secure and unique passwords for each account
By using secure passwords, you can effectively thwart credential stuffing attacks and dictionary attacks. The hackers and cybercriminals use bots and botnets to steal and validate the user credential as a precursor for an account takeover attack. The commonly used passwords like admin 123, 0000, and 12345… are easily cracked by the bots. Therefore, using a secure and unique password makes it hard for hackers to take over your account or even break the password.
Disabling the unused ports
Bots and botnets use the unused ports to enter your online infrastructure in stealth mode. An intelligent bot even opens a port for connection with the command-and-control center. They then receive instructions and execute them while sending the results back to the C&C center.
Conclusion
Never underestimate the severity of a botnet attack. It has the potential of crippling your online presence or attracting huge losses in lawsuits because of violation of GDP regulations. Investing proactively in botnet protection can be the best way to ensure healthy traffic, keeping the botnets at bay, and ensuring that your online presence is not affected. DataDome uses the most recent technologies like AI and machine learning for real-time tracking and analysis of incoming and outgoing traffic to effectively protect you from the botnets and keep you from DoS and DDoS attacks.
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