eLife Strategy

What are honeypots and hackerpots ?

An honeypot is a web site or server designed as a trap to conteract attacks from hackers or any other unauthorized use of the network. It is willingly set as very vulnerable, so that spammers and other script kiddies will run for it. It's set to use the same old protocols (Http, Pop3, Ftp), and the hacker thinks he can use this to either attack, enter or shut down your server.

The traps needs to be really well thought, because of you have a really big security break in a very well known company, your trap will be detected and nobody will run for it. As securisa.com says, more evoluted the trap is, bigger is the fish.

I guess it’s called honeypot because it attracts hackers and cybercriminals just like honey attracts bees.

There are various types of honeypots, but for example, one them is used to prevent spamming. Instead of sending spamming mail, the honeypot is able to see wich tools spammers are using, their IP adresses, and other useful information.

It's mainly used to gather information on new illegal practices and new spamming tools, so that engineers can develop new protections. It's mainly about "learning experience, that is, you may not catch any hackers". (searchsecurity.com).

It’s very useful too, but it requires much attention, and can be used as a gateway to break through your real computing system.

Hackerpots work just the same way, but are run by hackers.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Sources :

Tags : hackerpots honeypots trap

Pages ayant pour tag : honeypots

1. honeypots : Trap your cybercriminals