Kitetoons
Sensitive Financial Information Is Stolen in a Man-in-the-Middle Ransomware Attack
Rick Is Held Hostage Due to a Man-in-the-Middle Attack
Data is a critical business enabler, both between internal constituents and with third parties. Service providers and businesses must use end-to-end encryption when sending, sharing, or transferring sensitive information—internally and externally with third parties. This includes email, file sharing, managed file transfer (MFT), web forms, and application programming interfaces (APIs). Without the right security layers and encryption standards in place, sensitive content communications are at risk of threats like man-in-the-middle attacks or eavesdropping attacks.
Rick, the Risky Rabbit, is working from a local coffee shop and emails a sensitive board presentation to a colleague. Unbeknownst to him, a bad actor was also in the coffee shop who instigates a man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack and intercepts his email containing the board presentation. A MITM attack intercepts private data in numerous ways when it is exchanged between a client and server. In this case, Rick’s board presentation is held ransom, and Rick must go to Stu, the Security Squirrel, for help. Some of the best ways to prevent an MITM attack is to use end-to-end encryption, a VPN, strong user credentials, and multi-factor authentication (MFA).