Zero-day vulnerabilities have grown into one of the biggest concerns in cybersecurity in the last few years. These attacks target large enterprises, individuals, or any business organization irrespective of its size and nature.
What Is Zero-Day Vulnerability?
Zero-day exploits or vulnerabilities are flaws or weaknesses in software applications, hardware, computer network, firmware, or operating system that is not known to security vendors. As these flaws are not known to security vendors, no patch will be available to fix them. Hackers make use of these vulnerabilities and write malicious code to exploit the security gap. Cybercriminals can make use of a spear-phishing email with attachments, phishing techniques, spam emails, etc to launch these attacks.
Impacts Of Zero-Day Attacks On Businesses
Some of the common impacts of zero-day attacks on businesses are:
Data Theft
Cybercriminals can make use of zero-day vulnerability to steal critical data of your business, buyers, or staff. This data can be used by the attackers to steal money, commit identity theft, etc.
Account Takeover
Attackers can make use of the vulnerability to get unauthorized access to the computer network of your business, server, website, etc. Hackers may also install a malware or phishing program to send malicious messages to your contacts.
Productivity Loss
Zero-day exploits can help attackers take control of your machinery, electronic communication, etc.
Damage To Reputation
If the zero-day exploit goes public, it can harm the reputation of your business negatively. Whether you have found a patch or not, these attacks can send out a public message that the cybersecurity measures of your business are not good enough and that your business data and machines are much susceptible to security breaches.
The servers of the hosting service of your choice should be free from zero-day vulnerabilities and this is important for both dedicated hosting and shared server hosting. If you are planning to go for shared hosting providers, you should confirm that their servers are safe.