Russian hackers are carrying out brute force attacks on US server infrastructure ahead of the 2020 presidential election, VPN company NordVPN has discovered
The company's researchers who conducted the study observed a steep increase in brute force attacks on servers in the USA, reaching 98%.
The findings come from a “Cyber Honeypot,” or a cluster of servers created to mimic real servers and trick cybercriminals into attacking them. Over the course of two months, the Cyber Honeypot was attacked on a daily basis, but the recent attacks stood out due to the number of attackers trying to break into servers .
Digital privacy expert Daniel Markuson, who works at NordVPN, provided further insight into the recent increase in attacks:
“The attacks targeting SSH and Telnet honeypots were designed to perform brute force attacks. Penetration attempts skyrocketed, reaching 98% overnight. What is interesting is that half of the attacks originated from a single network, with no attempt to disguise that they originated from St. Petersburg, Russia.”
Increase in cyber attacks
According to Markuson, Russian hackers may be trying to take advantage of the fact that American citizens are preoccupied with the election and not paying much attention to their own online security.
Security researchers use honeypots as a means to understand what types of attacks are most common these days and what types of malware, viruses, and attacks are most commonly used by cybercriminals .Based on the information gleaned from honeypots, businesses and cybersecurity professionals can better protect themselves from the latest cyber threats.
Markuson also urges both businesses and ordinary users to take their online security more seriously and to remain constantly vigilant, saying:
“Members of the public, companies and governments should develop the good habit of taking cybersecurity measures by default. Websites should use HTTPS by default, databases should not be left unprotected and users should be strongly encouraged to surf the Internet using VPNs to protect themselves from eavesdropping and attacks.”
