Introduction to Credential Harvesting
Credential harvesting is the attack mechanism employed by attackers to steal usernames and passwords as anonymous user credentials. Unauthorized access to accounts can be achieved by the attackers once credential harvesting is complete, and it can lead to identity theft, forgery of funds, company espionage, and other kinds of cyber attacks. Credential harvesting is one of the relatively newer threats to the cyber world. It targets individuals, groups, and government institutions.
How Credential Harvesting Occurs
What is credential harvesting in cyber security? Credential harvesting is the process of employing more than one method to impersonate individuals into submitting their credentials or taking advantage of a vulnerability in a system to acquire login credentials. Computer attacks employ deceptive methods that are employed for credential gathering by malicious websites, phishing, malware, and social engineering attacks.
Most Frequently Employed Credential Harvesting Mechanisms
Phishing Attacks: Spoofed email or message requesting users to enter their credentials on a fake login page.
Keylogging Malware: Malicious program on the victim machine capturing keystrokes, i.e., login credentials in real-time.
Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) Attacks: Interception of user and trusted service conversation in an attempt to capture credentials.
Data Breaches: Infamously well-documented attacks on databases exposing usernames, passwords, and other sensitive data.
Social Engineering’s Role in Credential Hijacking
Social engineering is also a key aspect of credential gathering. The hackers use psychological manipulation techniques to gather the login credentials of the users. The impersonation scams are one of the prevalent social engineering attacks:
Impersonation Scams: The hackers will masquerade as official entities, i.e., banks or support groups, and ask for login credentials.
Urgency and Fears Tactics: Impersonating a false urgency, i.e., notifying the users that their accounts are being targeted and subsequently asking them to log in using the duplicated links.
False Customer Care Calls: Impersonators in the guise of customer care agents to obtain credentials during technical diagnostic procedures.
Credential Harvesting Attack Modes
Phishing Attacks
Phishing will be extensive Credential Harvesting. Spim or messages, emails, or websites that are in fact spoofing to look like authentic websites and that ask a victim to enter his or her credentials are attacked.
Malware-Based and Keylogging Attacks
Malware and keyloggers are used by cyberthieves to capture all keystrokes typed by the victims, including their login credentials.
Malware propagates from malicious email attachments, trojanized app downloads, or through an infected web.
Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) Attacks
MitM attacks refer to the hijacking of login credentials through communication interception between a user and a website. The attackers may intercept user interaction while on public Wi-Fi.
Credential Dumping and Data Leaks
Hackers pilfer gigantic sets of usernames and passwords from large companies and sell them on the dark net or to use for credential-stuffing attacks, where the attackers utilize the pilfered credentials across various websites.
Effects of Credential Harvesting
Financial Consequences and Identity Theft
Illegitimately stolen credentials allow the hacker to access bank and financial accounts and result in unauthorized use, identity theft, and counterfeit spending.
Business Espionage and Information Leaks
Credential harvesting is a ginormous threat for businesses as the hackers receive business-critical information, trade secrets, and intellectual property.
Hacked Accounts and Privilege Escalation
The account owners may deny authorized users, propagate malware, send spam messages, or execute other forms of cyber attacks.
Countermeasures Against Credential Harvesting
Utilization of Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
MFA safeguards with greater than single-factor authentication, i.e., passwords and random numbers acquired on their laptops.
Unorthodox and Abstruse Passwords
Insistent demands on unique and weird passwords across numerous accounts will keep exposure of passwords cracked at a minimum.
Identification and Blockage of Phishing Attacks
Gentle awareness regarding security through the identification of phishing emails, doubtful link discovery, and spoof site discovery will slow down attacks with credential harvesting.
Safe Network Practice Enforcement
HTTPS, not sharing sensitive work on public Wi-Fi, and VPNs can also be used to make the internet more secure.
Use of Password Manager and Security Program
Password generators generate powerful passwords and keep them securely stored, reducing weak or compromised credentials.
6. Detection of Credential Harvesting Attack
An Attempt to Detect Credential Harvesting
Business organizations must identify malicious login identities, unusual patterns of user behavior, and unfamiliar geographic logs.
What to do if there is a credential breach
- Recover passwords in a timely fashion when they are compromised.
- Enable MFA on affected accounts.
- Notify other impacted stakeholders and IT security teams.
- Scan for malicious transactions or activity regularly.
Incident Response Team Mitigation Role
Incident response teams will have to look for vulnerabilities, quarantine threats, and install security patches to prevent future credential-harvesting activity.
New Credential Harvesting and Cybersecurity Trends
AI Phishing Attacks
Cyber attackers are employing AI for the creation of sophisticated phishing attacks that are harder to detect.
Cybersecurity Defense Innovation
Sophisticated defense solutions like behavior analysis and biometric authentication are being adopted as a countermeasure against credential hijacking.
Daily User Awareness Training Requirement
Daytime awareness and daily cyber security training place the users in a position where they can identify the threats and safeguard their credentials.
Conclusion and Final Thoughts
Credential harvesting is an unsafe cyber attack, but users can prevent it by following best-practice security, using alternative authentication modes, and implementing antiphishing measures. If users understand how credential harvesting occurs and take all necessary precautions, they can keep their sensitive information safe from thieves and reduce the impact of cyber attacks.
