Over the past decade, millions of businesses have embraced web applications as an inexpensive way to build relationships and transactions with prospects and customers. But while they provide the opportunity for greater customer insight and efficiency, web applications also have vulnerabilities that can be exploited by cybercriminals. One of the most common and devastating of these is a web attack.
A web attack is one type of cyberattack in which an attacker takes on the identity of another to gain access to sensitive information or do malicious acts, such as taking credit card numbers, or other personal information. Common types of web-based attacks include Structured Query Language injection (SQLi) as well as cross-site scripting (XSS), and file upload attacks.
In an SQLi attack hackers insert customized Structured Query Language commands into the web application or website field to steal private data stored on the database server backend. In an XSS attack, hackers insert malicious code into websites or web apps that the victim’s browser executes automatically without verification or encoding. The attack can hijack the victim’s session, display unauthorised images or words or redirect them to a fraudulent website.
The best way to guard against cyber-attacks is to perform regular vulnerability checks, and then apply patches to your site, its web servers and any databases that are underlying. It is also an ideal idea to create an incident response plan in order that should an attack occur it can be quickly identified and responded to. Also, ensure that you are aware of how to spot an attack on your website by observing warning indicators such as slowdowns in the network or intermittent shutdowns of websites.
