Simply put, a data leak is when sensitive data is unknowingly exposed to the public, and a data breach is an event caused by a cyberattack. An example of a data leak is a software misconfiguration facilitating unauthorized access to sensitive resources - such as the major Microsoft Power Apps data leak in 2021. An example of a data breach is a cybercriminal overcoming network security controls to gain access to sensitive resources.

A data exfiltration attack involves the unauthorized transfer of sensitive data, such as personal data and intellectual property, out of a target system and into a separate location. These transfers could either occur internally, through insider threats, or externally, through remote Command and Control servers. Every cyberattack with a data theft objective could be classified as a data exfiltration attack.

Picture this. You’re an administrator in charge of providing basic amenities and day-to-day needs across 1,000 beds in an urban multispecialty hospital. One fine morning, you notice that all the patients’ bedside monitoring systems (the computer-like devices that display patient vitals like heartbeat and blood pressure) have stopped functioning, leaving doctors and nurses in the dark.

In the latter part of December 2021, WhiteSource Diffend detected the new release of a package called @maui-mf/app-auth. This package used a vector of attack that was similar to the server side request forgery (SSRF) attack against Capital One in 2019, in which a server was tricked into executing commands on behalf of a remote user, thereby enabling the user to treat the server as a proxy for requests and gain access to non-public endpoints.

Tsippi Dach explores some notable breaches caused by mis configuration s and how organizations can avoid becoming the next big headline.

Organizations often have their confidential information illicitly for sale on the darknets, but they don’t know it. Statistically, over 75% of compromised credentials are reported to the victim organization by law enforcement when it has become too late. That’s why dark web monitoring tools providers are the appropriate solution to help you know on time when your credentials are stolen and exposed on the dark web.