How to Know If Your Business is a Victim of Cyber Crime

Did you know the average business experiences approximately 130 online security breaches a year? Adding to that, 60% of small to medium-sized businesses never recover from major hacks and shut down within 6 months of a security breach. Cybercriminals have many reasons for executing attacks on websites. And cyber crime comes in many forms.

From identity theft to financial fraud, from hijacking your site in exchange for ransom money to attacking your site in an attempt to shut it down, one thing is true: There’s no telling why cybercriminals might target your business. And to make matters worse, sometimes your organization comes under attack, and you don’t even know it.

If you run an online business and want to learn the surefire ways to tell whether you’ve been the victim of cyber crime, keep reading. We’re going to share with you some signs that indicate your business has been hacked, as well as the number one way to help put a stop to all attempts of cybercrime against your company. But first, let’s take a quick look at the most common types of cyber crime.

Common Types of Cyber Crime

As we mentioned earlier, cyber crime comes in many forms. If you want to be able to identify when cybercriminals have attacked your business, it’s a good idea to familiarize yourself with the different types of cyber crime first:

– Botnets: pieces of software controlled by remote hackers that aim to bring websites down (e.g., Distributed denial-of-service attacks).

– Fraud: any deceitful behavior that aims to gain access to important data for the purpose of altering, destroying, stealing, or suppressing it (e.g., identity theft).

– Hacking: when a cybercriminal seizes all or part of a system, network, or website in hopes of breaking things, stealing data, or holding it ransom.

– Viruses: when cybercriminals use viruses to infect and destroy computers, networks, and systems while spreading through the internet and removable devices.

– Ransomware: malware-based attacks that encrypt your files and hold them hostage until you pay large sums of money.

– Phishing: the act of encouraging people to download unwanted applications or hand over personal details. This can take place on the internet, over email, phone, text, and more.

– Browser Hijacking: hijacking browser settings and changing things like the homepage and default search engine so ads generating the hijacker money can display. Browser hijacking can also redirect website URLs using viruses.

Of course, these are just the most common types of cyber crime your business might encounter. There is also malvertising, cyberbullying, software piracy, scamming, and much more that can wreak havoc on your business. But for now, it’s time to learn how to tell if your business has been affected.

1. Unusual Redirects

If your site visitors or team members start complaining that their browser is redirecting to a place other than your site’s homepage, it’s highly likely a redirect virus has infected your business.

These viruses usually hide in computers that have bundled software downloaded on them. They might also appear when an infected browser extension has been inserted.

Here’s what to look for when you think your business has fallen prey to a redirect virus:

– Despite your homepage possibly looking the same after a quick redirect, note the tiny differences such as footer text, small color scheme changes, and varying fonts.

– After clicking on what should be your homepage, or some other legitimate webpage, you see nothing but advertisements instead of the real content.

If you notice redirects, small changes on webpages, or a page full of advertisements that are not your own, it’s time to take action. For instance, utilize the power of redirect detection software and always have a professional IT technician download any software your business is using. Doing this will help prevent, detect, and remove redirect viruses.

2. Unfamiliar Emails

Another surefire sign your business is under attack is when you start receiving unusual emails. These emails might look like they’re from someone you know initially, but once you open them, you’ll notice strange links or attachments. Anytime you or someone else in your business interacts with any of the strange links or attachments in these phishing emails, damage occurs.

Just the act of downloading an attachment or clicking an infected link can spread malware throughout your computer, systems, and network. Adding to that, if you reply to or forward these emails, you further the damage by spreading it to other computers.

Hackers that partake in phishing attacks are hoping to get you to make their jobs easier by doing the damage and spreading it further yourself.

Another strategy phishing hackers use is sending emails that seem legitimate, and asking for personal information such as usernames, passwords, credit card information, and even social security numbers.

Educating yourself and your team about phishing attacks and the harm they can bring is one of the best ways to prevent this type of cyber crime.

For instance, encourage your team to use strong passwords. This is easily done using a free online tool such as LastPass’ Password Generator.

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You can also enforce things like CAPTCHAs, two-factor authentication, and just plain common sense.

3. Inability to Open Files

When your business’ files become encrypted (or hidden) by cybercriminals, the number one motivation is money. Hackers will tap into your system, hijack some or all of your organization’s files, and demand money for their return. This is most commonly known as ransomware, and it has been documented to cost businesses billions of dollars each year. And unfortunately, since this is an effective way of attacking businesses, there is no end in sight.

The problem with ransomware is that you and your team won’t necessarily know your systems are infected until you go to open and file and find that it won’t open. By then, the damage is done, and the only way out is to pay the ransom (which is never recommended) or restore your systems to a time before the encryption occurred. But if you haven’t been diligent about backing up your site’s files, you’re basically stuck.

If you use WordPress to run your business, there are tons of great WordPress backup plugins designed to back up your site’s files and give you easy, one-click restore functionality.

For example, UpdraftPlus is one of the most popular and easy to use backup plugins in the market.

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If you don’t use WordPress, you can manually back up your site’s files or use your web host cPanel to schedule backups. Or, you can  use an automated backup tool like Backup Machine to safely store non-infected files.

4. External Control of Your Website

One of the most visible signs your site is under attack is when you notice things like your mouse cursor moving on its own. Known as a remote desktop hack, this type of attack signals that your systems and connected equipment is not secure and is open for others to take over.

Hackers do this for many reasons:

– To cause you stress and have fun
– In an attempt to ruin the user experience for site visitors, so they’ll go to the competition (which is sometimes the hacker)
– As a way to rearrange elements on your site to ruin its visual appeal
– To redirect site visitors (using invisible code) to their websites or ads to generate money
– As a way steal internal information such as customers’ financial information or other important files
– To shut down your entire organization, so it’s inoperable
– To inject malicious code on your site

Determining the point of entry can be difficult in this situation, especially if you have an extensive network with many computers connected. Besides running routine virus scans and being proactive about security best practices, there isn’t a whole lot you can do to if you haven’t secured your systems properly.

The Best Way to Prevent Cyber Crime

The best way to prevent your business from becoming a victim of cyber crime is to be proactive about securing your websites, systems, and networks. While you can implement your own security measures to protect parts of your business, it’s best to invest in managed SIEM services so you can enjoy the following benefits:

– Real-time threat monitoring
– 24/7 protection from security experts
– Eliminate the need for expensive hardware or third-party support contracts
– Intrusion detection and prevention
– File integrity monitoring
– Data loss prevention
– Full management of infrastructure, websites, applications, networks, and systems
– Regular reporting of all incidents
– Scalable security measures as your business grows
– And much more

By hiring security experts to protect your business and handle any cyberattacks, you save yourself time, become more productive, and earn more money in the long run. After all, surviving a serious security breach is not something that many businesses can do. And for those that do, the negative impact is felt far and wide.

Money to fix and secure things, a reputation to restore, and customers to win back are just some of the things even the biggest enterprises have had to deal with after a cyber attack. So, do yourself a favor and manage your business’ security measures from the start by actively securing your entire organization.

And most importantly, learn to recognize the signs that you’ve been attacked, so you can quickly resolve any issues and prevent long term damage to your business.