Cyber Combat: Learn to Defend Against Cyber Attacks and Corporate Spying

By Zeph Reese

Fast-paced, practical, and hands-on. Cyber Combat is a book every person interested in protecting themselves from cyber threats can put to use immediately.

You'll learn how to:

 

• Protect your complete digital ecosystem including personal data, desktop devices, smartphones, home network, IoT devices against all types of viruses & malware.
• Never fall victim to a cyber attack again. Spot and defeat the sophisticated social engineering techniques being deployed by cyber criminals in order to exploit human nature.
• Prevent corporate data collection and counter the tracking of your online activities. .
• Clean up your digital footprint, practice privacy hygiene and take back control of your digital identity.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tech Agon
• Release date: May 5, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223049012

Book preview

CYBER COMBAT

LEARN TO DEFEND YOURSELF FROM CYBER ATTACKS AND CORPORATE SPYING

ZEPH REESE

Contents

Title Page

PREFACE

Who This Book Is For

What’s in the Book?

PART I: INTRODUCTION

Cyber security and Privacy

Important Terms in Cybersecurity

Risk assessment

CHAPTER 1: DEFINING YOUR THREAT MODEL

Protect What You Value

The Threat Landscape

Know Your Enemies

What’s the Worst that Could Happen?

A Risk Based Approach

The Methodology of an Attack

PART II: SECURITY IN ACTION

CHAPTER 2: Operating System Security

CHAPTER 3: Virus & Malware Protection in Windows

CHATPER 4: Taking A Proactive Approach to Security

CHAPTER 5: Macs Are Not Immune

CHAPTER 6: Web Browser Security

CHAPTER 7: Home Network Security

CHAPTER 8: Smartphone Security

PART III: SOCIAL ENGINEERING

CHAPTER 9: Social Engineering Concepts & Attacks

CHAPTER 10: Social Engineering Defence Strategies

PART IV: THE BATTLE FOR ONLINE PRIVACY

CHAPTER 11: Why Care About Privacy?

CHAPTER 12: Operating System Privacy

CHAPTER 13: Web Browser Privacy

CHAPTER 14: Online Tracking

CHAPTER 15: Your Digital Footprint

CHAPTER 16: Metadata

CHAPTER 17: Smartphone Privacy

CHAPTER 18: Communication Apps

References

About The Author

PREFACE

In recent years, cybercrime has risen to record levels and continues to grow exponentially. Every minute of the day, individuals and organisations suffer monetary loss from cyber attacks, not to mention the emotional and psychological effect. The personal information of countless people is exposed in data breaches every day.  Information which is then used by cyber criminals to launch more attacks on people like you.

Antivirus software is no longer enough to protect you from advanced malware or the sophisticated social engineering techniques being deployed by today’s cybercriminals. Desktop computers, laptops, tablets, smartphones, networks, and smart devices all offer plenty of opportunities for exploitation.

Data is the new oil, a much sought after commodity in the digital age. Large amounts of personal data is being collected by shadowy entities who track, identify, and profile you across websites, and even devices. Your data is then sold, shared, and used for various purposes. A large digital footprint is a target on your back. Cyber attacks, identity theft, cyberstalking, scams, are just some of the consequences of having your privacy breached.

This book is an accumulation of many years of direct experience in the IT field as well as extensive research into the areas of information security and privacy. You will learn the skills, knowledge, tools and the mindset required to defend yourself, not only from current cyber threats, but also those that will emerge in the future.

Who This Book Is For

I believe this book would be a useful resource for people from all walks of life. Parents, students, business owners, marketers, salespeople, anyone who wants to protect themselves from cyber threats. Readers from all backgrounds and age groups, who are interested in cyber security, and those with or without a lot of technical knowledge will benefit from reading this book.

What’s in the Book?

The following breakdown of each section gives you an idea of the topics we’ll explore:

PART I: Introduction

This section introduces some key concepts of cybersecurity including threat modelling. The importance of defining the threat model which is unique to each person is also discussed. It also gives a brief overview of the kind of threats that currently exist in the cyber world.

PART II: Security in Practice

This part of the book dives straight into the practical side of cyber security, covering a broad range of technical controls, strategies, and tools that can be deployed to secure your digital ecosystem. There’s an emphasis on taking a proactive approach to security so that you can stop attacks from succeeding in the first place rather than dealing with the aftermath.

PART III: Social Engineering

This part of the book lays out key concepts of social engineering and the pivotal role it plays in all kinds of attacks. The close relationship between social engineering and human psychology is discussed. The various types of social engineering attacks are also covered along with the strategies to defend against them.

PART IV: Privacy in Practice

The final part of the book explores topics related to online privacy such as the collection and misuse of personal data by large corporations, tech companies, social media platforms and data brokers. The methods used by entities to identify and track users are also discussed as well as strategies to counter them. The actions and practices we can employ to take control of our personal information and improve our overall privacy is the main theme of this section.

PART I: INTRODUCTION

The purpose of cybersecurity is to identify the assets you want to protect, calculate the risks related to those assets and take necessary actions to safeguard those assets. Not all security risks can be eliminated and not all assets are worth protecting.  This is where threat modelling plays an important role. The goal is to protect your most valued assets against attacks that are most probable.  That way you will avoid wasting time, money, and effort in ways that don’t make sense.

Cyber security and Privacy

There’s a close relationship between cybersecurity and privacy. In the context of cybersecurity, privacy is the right and ability of an individual to control how their personal information is stored, shared and used. Cybersecurity plays an important role in ensuring that personal data is not breached. Choosing an application or service often requires a compromise between security and privacy. An example of this would be antivirus software or even operating systems. We sacrifice some of our privacy when using an antivirus, in return for protection against malware and other threats. The important thing is to be aware of the security and privacy risks when selecting a product or service.

Important Terms in Cybersecurity

Asset

Any piece of data or device that needs to be protected.

Threat

Any potential event that could undermine your efforts to defend your assets. Threats can be intentional attacks from threat actors or unintentional events, such as leaving your computer without locking it.

Attack surface

Your attack surfaces are the places and ways you are vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

Black Hat, Attacker, Threat Actor, Bad actor, Adversary, Malicious hacker

A person, organisation or entity who could cause you harm by undermining your security, privacy, or anonymity. We share some common adversaries, but they can also be unique for each person. Often the adversary is hypothetical.

Threat model

A way of thinking about the sorts of protection you want so you can protect the assets you value the most.

Threat Modelling

The process of determining which assets you need to protect and from whom.

Risk assessment

Calculating the chance that threats might succeed, so you know what resources to spend defending against them. There are countless ways that your assets can be attacked but some are less likely to succeed. Conducting a risk assessment means deciding the threats you are going to take seriously, and those that might be rare or harmless, or too difficult to combat and worry about.

CHAPTER 1: DEFINING YOUR THREAT MODEL

To make effective use of the information in this book, you need to ask the question: What am I trying to protect and from whom? This is essentially threat modelling in a nutshell. Defining your threat model will give you a goal to work towards. It will act as guidance and a framework that you can work within so that you don’t waste time and money on goals that are not relevant to you. There isn’t a one size fits