The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center (HC3) says hackers are currently conducting credential harvesting campaigns targeting recipients in the health sector, in addition to recipients in other industries. I made it clear that. The agency has issued recommendations for necessary protection and mitigation to help organizations minimize their risk against such attacks.
Credential harvesting is a technique used by cyber attackers to unknowingly collect legitimate usernames and passwords from victims for use in future attacks. This could result in fraud, data theft, disruption of critical systems, or other malicious effects. Through this method, cyber attackers collect sensitive information from individuals or systems (usually usernames, passwords, and other authentication data) and gain unauthorized access to accounts, systems, networks, or services. This technique is often used as the first step in more complex, malicious, and large-scale cyberattacks.
Additionally, credential harvesting allows attackers to gain initial access, escalate privileges, exfiltrate sensitive data, disrupt systems, or engage in additional malicious activities such as identity theft or financial fraud. It becomes possible.
Credential harvesting techniques include phishing, which uses fake emails designed to appear legitimate to trick victim recipients into clicking a link or opening an attachment within the email. Included. This delivers malicious code to the victim's system and continues the cyber attack. A man-in-the-middle attack involves capturing a user's credentials while being sent for legitimate purposes as part of a valid login attempt. Keylogging is another technique that allows hackers to deploy malicious software to intercept a victim's keystrokes. This may include credentials entered as part of a valid login attempt.
HC3 also recognized credential stuffing, where large datasets are frequently compromised as a result of cyber-attacks. These can be posted for public access or bought and sold on the dark web. Once a malicious attacker obtains the exposed credentials, they may attempt to use the same credentials to compromise other accounts associated with the same individual. This attack is based on the idea that individuals may resort to reusing passwords. This is the tendency to reuse the same credentials, especially passwords, on many platforms because it is not possible to remember many different passwords. Credential stuffing is the use of compromised credentials associated with an individual to attempt to compromise other accounts associated with that individual.
We also identified social engineering, or employing social manipulation techniques to get unsuspecting individuals to reveal their credentials. Malicious attackers often attempt to perform social engineering by impersonating help desk employees or authority figures.
Another technique is fake login web pages, pharming, or watering hole attacks. This is designed to make web pages look legitimate and often includes a username and password login prompt. When victims enter their credentials, they often receive a message that the site is temporarily down while their credentials are being recorded by the attacker. Finally, HC3 lists malware malicious software that can collect victim credentials and report them to threat actors.
HC3 urged organizations to implement robust defense and mitigation strategies against credential harvesting attacks. Key measures include enforcing strong and unique passwords. Avoid reusing passwords across accounts. Maintain a healthy skepticism of suspicious emails. Recognize phishing attempts. Be wary of suspicious websites. Ensure credentials are sent only to legitimate sites or applications. Validate insecure communications to protect both personal and organizational security.
The agency also notes that multi-factor authentication (MFA), which uses multiple means of authentication, reduces the likelihood of a breach because even if one factor (such as a password) is compromised, another factor is required to access the system. We also confirmed that it is possible to minimize the It also states that email/malspam filtering can be implemented and properly configured to minimize the amount of unwanted traffic coming into your organization. Phishing is one of the most prolific infection vectors used by cyber attackers, and proper filtering can minimize the associated risks.
When it comes to endpoint security, HC3 elaborated that endpoint security solutions can help detect and prevent malware-based credential harvesting techniques such as keylogging. The agency recognized that monitoring/detection, which provides real-time, comprehensive event and incident analysis across enterprise infrastructure, can help identify credential harvesting attacks as they occur. Utilizing the right tools and maintaining a properly trained staff will improve this ability.
The agency also calls for vulnerability/patch management, saying keeping software and systems up to date with the latest security patches and updates can be exploited by attackers to obtain credentials. It says it may help address known vulnerabilities. Maintaining a comprehensive and accurate inventory of all IT assets increases your chances of success in this area. We also covered incident handling/response in developing and maintaining a full lifecycle incident handling and response program that can minimize the impact of credential collection on operations and patients.
