Regardless of the newest safeguards put in place against hackers, they always seem to find their way in. Computer hackers have been a problem for businesses and governments since the beginning of the computer age. Take a few steps to help protect your business from hackers.
SQL Injection
A structured query language, or SQL, injection can be used to attack your computer by inserting SQL statements into a website. This makes the website perform operations that are controlled by the hacker. One such operation is to transfer database information to the hacker. This puts your business and customer information at risk. A well-designed website is the best way to secure the information for your business and your customers. A query language that has been designed against attack can be used to prevent SQL injections.
Cross-Site Scripting
Cross-site scripting, or XSS is a common security threat to websites. It allows hackers to bypass access controls. The attacker is able to gain access to confidential information maintained by a web browser by injecting malicious scripts into the web page. This leaves the users of your website vulnerable to an attack. It is highly recommended that webmasters use a security-encoding library to prevent the most common types of XSS attacks. HTML sanitation tools, content filtering and cookie security can be used to help decrease the threat of XSS. Disabling scripts as a web browser default and then enabling scripts when necessary also diminishes the frequency of these attacks.
Encryption
It is vital to encrypt any confidential information. First, you need to know what information is critical enough to require encryption. If you entrusted someone else to build your website, you need to double-check for proper encryption. Even professional web designers make mistakes when using encryption in web site applications. You should check for strong algorithms, procedures used for required maintenance, proper support for encryption key changes. The most important protection against attacks include encryption of all vital information and secure storage of passwords, keys, certificates and secrets in the memory.
.htaccess
You can restrict access to your web directories by using .htaccess. This allows you to restrict user access to designated Internet addresses as well as authenticate users. Use file transfer protocol to establish easy limits on the directories within your web pages. You must then use ASCII mode to upload these files. Anyone attempting to access these files without authority will receive a simple access denied message.
Remote Code Execution and Username Enumeration
Remote code execution and username enumeration are two of the top exploits associated with PHP applications. Hypertext preprocessor applications are the most common of all scripting languages. Some advanced protection patches are available to stop attacks on web hosting environments. Remote code execution is one of the easiest ways for hackers to take advantage of vulnerabilities in widely distributed software. It is a software bug that allows an attacker to execute commands from one computer to another. Username enumeration is a vulnerability that occurs when accounts that were created for testing purposes are not erased. This allows an attacker to guess the common usernames and passwords often used for testing software. To avoid this type of vulnerability, do not use an error message that lets the user know when they have correctly guessed a username.
As hackers learn their way around the newest security technology, you need to continue upgrading your website for the best protection. Although there is no way to know the newest techniques hackers may develop for attacking websites, you can protect yourself from known techniques. Build a strong website and continue make changes as necessary to help secure vital data. When building your website, remember that poor web design is the usual cause for any of these attacks.