Malwares are malicious software programs that are designed by hijackers to hack the system or interrupt the computer network. They use these malicious programs to steal the system data or take control of the system or websites or generate more traffic by navigating the users to unrelated websites while they are working on their websites.
Types of Malware
The following are some of the malware that attacks the system or the network.
Viruses
A computer virus is a piece of harmful software that spreads by copying itself to other programs, hard drives, or documents and modifies the system’s function.
Worms
Worms malware can replicate themselves automatically across computers and networks by taking advantage of security flaws. The main distinction between a virus and a worm is that worms are standalone hostile programs that may self-replicate and spread once they have infiltrated the system, whereas viruses require the activation of their host in order to start. Worms’ programming can be executed and propagated without any human involvement or activation.
Trojans
Trojans or Trojan Horse Malware pretend as trustworthy programs or software. Attackers have access to all operations that a normal user could perform once they are within the network, including transferring files, manipulating data, removing files, and changing the contents of the device.
Adware
Though adware is not exactly a harmful virus, it is considered a virus due to its misleading behavior with the user by taking them to irrelevant content by navigating online users to some other websites designed by the hacker for generating more traffic for their websites.
Ransomware
Ransomware is infectious software that uses encryption to collect a ransom for the victim’s data. Critical data for a user or organization is encrypted to prevent access to files, databases, or applications. Then access is sought in exchange for a ransom.
Spyware
Spyware is malicious software that installs itself on the system and begins to track or monitor the infected system’s user’s online activity without their knowledge or consent. After monitoring, this Software transmits the collected data from the affected system to third parties.
Cryptomining
Cryptomining or Cryptojacking is the malware that is trending in the current days. It targets the computer system to mine the cryptocurrencies or bitcoin. It uses the system resources like the system CPU or system GPU to execute intricate mathematical operations that produce hashes, or long strings of alphanumeric characters.
Botnet
A botnet, sometimes known as a “robot network,” is a collection of malware-infected computers that are managed by a single attacker, also referred to as a “bot-herder.” A bot is any particular machine that the bot-herder is in control of.
Info Stealers
Info Stealers are also malware that is used for stealing the user’s information or data like passwords or any other important data.
Polymorphic Malware
Malware software known as a polymorphic virus, sometimes known as a metamorphic virus, is designed to repeatedly change its signature files or outward appearance by utilizing new decryption techniques.
How to find malwares on the network
The software named Intrusion Detection System is used to find the presence of the malwares, viruses, trojans, worms, or any other malicious programs in the network. The notification will be sent to the users if there exist any malwares. The open sources tools like Snort and Nmap are used for this network malwares detection process.
Snort
Snort is the most popular Open Source Intrusion Prevention System (IPS), used to identify malicious activity. The Snort has some set of rules to find the malware. Based on the rules, it will look for the packets that match the malware and if it finds any match, it will notify the user by generating an alert.
Snort can be implemented locally to block those malicious packets. It has three applications, as a packet sniffer similar to tcpdump(a packet analyzer), as a traffic logger for troubleshooting network traffic, and as a full-fledged network intrusion detection system. It can be used for private and commercial purposes.
Nmap
Nmap (Network Mapping) is also a free and open-source tool for network discovery and security auditing. It is helpful for duties like managing service upgrade schedules, network inventory, and host or service uptime, according to several systems and network managers.
IDS solutions identify attacks using signature- and anomaly-based detection techniques. An anomaly-based IDS employs machine learning to identify unusual activity and alert the user, while a signature-based IDS looks for malicious patterns in traffic based on well-known attacks.
Anomaly-based IDS systems are more effective than the other approach at searching networks for new malware and viruses. For signature-based techniques to remain effective and defend against undiscovered zero-day attacks, they must be updated often.
Tips to remove malwares from the network
Disconnect the network
Once the malwares have been found, it is crucial to promptly cut off access to the local network from the Internet. In order to stop malwares from connecting to external sites or getting infected again from an external source, it is necessary to disconnect the network as soon as possible.
Scan the system
Use a reliable antivirus program with the most recent database updates to scan all of the PCs. The most recent updates should be transferred to and installed on any workstations that lack them using portable media. A sample should be provided to malware experts for investigation if the antivirus is unable to identify the infection.
One can look at a number of characteristics, such as network traffic (malware files typically generate a lot of network traffic and take up a lot of system resources), Windows System folders, or the System Registry to identify the start-up keys for the malware files, to find the executable files that make up the malware.
Remove Infected Files
Infected files should be found and deleted once the PCs have been scanned with reliable malware-eradication programs. The infected files can all be safely deleted at that point. To avoid destroying crucial data, always thoroughly verify the files in the trapped list.
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