How Major Malware Attacks Shaped the Future of Cyber Defense

“In cybersecurity, the only constant is change. The bad guys are always adapting, so we must always be prepared to adapt as well.”
– Kemba Walden, Cybersecurity Executive, Microsoft

You must have heard about the increasing number of sophisticated cyber attacks these days. Last year only, there were over 6 billion malware attacks worldwide, which is about 190,000 attacks per second. (Exploding Topics: How many cyber attacks occur each day?) 

These statistics are truly shocking and raise various questions. “Why has this sudden surge been observed in recent years?”, “Is there anything that companies are doing to prevent such attacks, or how do these cyberattackers bypass the security measures”? 

Whenever the defense line is breached, the cybersecurity community works on even bigger and secure systems. This is how the evolution in the complexity and scale of malware attacks contributes to enhanced cyber defense. 

In this article, I will walk you through the history of malware attacks and tell you how they played a role in digital security systems and will continue to do so in the future. 

The Morris Worm: A Warning from the Early Days of the Internet

Let’s start with a worm that introduced itself in the early days of computing and crawled through the Unix operating system. Not a real worm, but it didn’t take Morris worms to spread across the early internet, just like an original one. At that time, roughly about 60,000 systems were connected, and according to Private Internet Access (PIA), 6,000 of them got infected with it. 

Key Cyber Defense Innovations

The huge impact of this small worm compelled the U.S. Department of Defense security to create the Computer Engineering Defense Team (CERT) to improve the coordination of digital threat responses. 

ILOVEYOU Virus: A Costly Lesson in Email Security

This virus not only exploited security vulnerabilities but human emotions as well. Imagine you receive an email with “ILOVEYOU” as the subject line, there is an enormous possibility that your curiosity will get the better of you, and you’ll open that email without any second thoughts. 

This is exactly what happened with the people in May 2000. Just after 10 days of release, it reached 45 million people and proved to be a costly love letter, causing approximately USD 10 billion in damages. 

Key Cyber Defense Innovations

Not only the improvements in technical aspects like better email attachment screening, this also contributed to user education programs on phishing and email safety. 

FUN FACT 
The ‘ILOVEYOU’ bug’s creator was traced back to a Filipino student who was initially trying to impress a girl.

Code Red Worm: Sparking a Revolution in Network Defense

Another worm, but this one was much stronger than the Morris worm. This self-replicating malware spread across hundreds and thousands of systems within hours of its release. 

The major targets of the code red worm included the White House’s official websites.  It would launch denial of service (DoS) attacks and then wait for further instructions or spread to other networks. 

Key Cyber Defense Innovations

Before the code red worm attack, the potential of self-replicating viruses was unknown to the security systems. It led to innovation in several critical areas such as patch management, network segmentation, and behavioral detection, and also highlighted the importance of in  firewalls defense.

Sasser Worm: A Call for Proactive Patch Management

In 2004, another attack shocked the world by being the first worm that spread through unpatched systems on the internet. It exploited vulnerabilities in the Microsoft Windows Local Authority Subsystem Services (LSASS) and affected many versions of Windows. 

Cybersecurity Improvements Developments

The major vulnerability of the system that it highlighted was the danger of delaying patching and how it invited malware to directly impact the bottom line of the companies.  

WannaCry Ransomware: The Ransomware Epidemic

This attack affected over 200,000 computers located in 150 different countries. It highlighted the issue of data management in critical infrastructures such as healthcare.  You’ll be surprised to know that this even impacted bigger names such as the UK’s National Health Services (NHS), FedEx, and Nissan.  

Key Cyber Defense Innovations

WannaCry sparked the global discussion on ransomware protection and regulations to minimize its impact such as timely software updates, patch management, and regular data backups. 

SolarWinds Attack: Raising Awareness of Supply Chain Vulnerabilities

You might remember seeing headlines about this highly sophisticated supply chain attack. Imagine you download a legitimate software update and get a free malware known as Sunburst with it. Sounds frustrating and weird, right? 

But this is exactly what happened in 2020. The hackers infiltrated SolarWinds’s Orion software update, which compromised more than 18,000 organizations that including some major U.S. agencies.  

Measures for combating cyber risk

This incident brought light to supply chain attacks and highlighted how important vendor selection and monitoring processes are for Safeguarding networks.

How These Attacks Continue to Shape Cyber Defense

I told you about the various steps taken by the online defense systems to tackle the concerning issues at the time of attack, but that does not end there. These attacks still play and will continue to play a major role in shaping cyber defense systems. 

Want to know how? The following five points will answer this question. 

• Proactive Monitoring and Response: Wouldn’t it be great if we identify the problems or take action on any suspicious activities before they turn into a bigger event? Proactive monitoring does exactly that. This approach detects and neutralizes threats early, minimizing risks and consequences. 

• Regular Updates and Patching: As I told you above, Code Red, Sasser, and many other worms were able to bypass the security systems due to unpatched vulnerability. Now the lessons have been learned, and we have realized how important it is to Patch updates and fix known vulnerabilities. 

• Network Segmentation: High traffic at a network increases the spread of a cyberattack when a connection is compromised. But if we divide and form sub-segments of a network, it would limit the spread of malware to the particular affected segment. 

• Employee Awareness: Humans are known to make mistakes, but as we discussed in the “ILOVEYOU” virus attack, some mistakes can be worth billions. Therefore, it is best if even the slightest possibility of it is avoided. 

Training and providing adequate knowledge to your employees will help ensure that they are equipped with the knowledge to recognize and avoid potential threats. 

• Zero-Trust Architecture: The security models in the past that trusted internal networks, included various risks. But the modern zero trust architecture trusts none, no matter where the requests originate from, it is rigorously authenticated and verified. 

DO YOU KNOW?
Around 1.2 billion malicious programs and potentially unwanted applications (PUA) are currently in existence.Alt Text – Total amount of malware and PUA (by year).

Conclusion

The digital defense systems were not always this intelligent and efficient as we know them today. From the six cyber attacks I discussed with you in this article, I think you must have understood how each event turned into a lesson for the cybersecurity defense systems and helped enhance the overall landscape. 

As the attacks evolve, the defense systems will follow through and always try to gain an edge and remain a step or two ahead of the potential risks. Also, with the integration of new technologies, the future of digital security solutions is certain to be remarkable.

Gaurav Rathore