It is a collection from Bitdefender, one of the leading protections provider for computers.
Cookie Threats:
In order to understand what cookie threats are, first of all, we need to understand what cookies are!
1. What Are Cookies?
From Microsoft Knowledge Base, we can learn the overview of what cookies represent: very small text files placed on the hard drive by a web server. They are essentially your identification cards, and cannot be executed as code or deliver viruses. They are uniquely yours and can only be read by the server that gave them to you. For example, a web-based email service (such as Yahoo!, MSN, or the like) uses cookies for identification purposes (the option “Remember me on this computer”). More information on what cookies can do and how to accept/deny sending and receiving cookies are available at the above-mentioned location.
2. How Can a Cookie Harm my Computer?
A cookie itself cannot harm the computer, as it does not and cannot hold code (therefore the cookie cannot perform an action itself). However, the cookie can support (help) malicious actions to be taken on the respective system. Even more, being a plain text file, they are vulnerable, meaning that they can be “harvested” by other applications.
3. Why Should I Scan the Cookies?
As already mentioned the cookies themselves cannot harm the computer. However, they can contain certain information to lead a possible attacker to the respective computer. For example, we will consider that an attacker releases a Trojan in the wild in order to gain control over several computers. This Trojan’s payload contains dropping a Backdoor (to open a port), changing the homepage of the browser, and placing a “malicious” cookie in the browser’s cookie area. When the unsuspecting user launches the browser, then it automatically connects to the new homepage (namely the attacker’s website).
Once this is done, the malicious cookie is being read and the attacker becomes aware of the fact that the computer is infected. By knowing this, it becomes a piece of cake to take over the computer using some exploits or the open port.
Let’s say that the user becomes aware of the infection and manages to remove the Trojan and the Backdoor from the computer. However, if the cookie remains on the computer, it can supply the information again to the attacker if the user “manages” to access the untrusted web page again. The computer is therefore exposed once again to a possible attack.
As explained in the above scenario, the cookie is used to provide information about a computer but it is not responsible for the attack itself.
4. Other Types of Malicious Attacks Using Cookies?
A similar case is represented by the fact that cookies are vulnerable to third-party attacks. Lately, the virus analysts discovered exploits (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, JavaScript) that allowed an attacker to harvest information from cookies using either different cookies or the so-called spyware software (for example login information for different servers the customer might use).
5. Are Cookies a Threat for our Privacy?
Cookies are of two types that stored in the system. Session cookies and Persistent cookies. The session cookies don’t have the retention ability after closing the browser and it is stored in temporary memory. When it comes to persistent cookies then it collects the statistical data of the website and user activity. Also, it is used for the provision of customized content. But these cookies create fewer privacy concerns than third-party cookies. It is the main type of cookies that create privacy concerns for users.
6. So!
When talking about cookies it’s important to know how to protect cookies from other cookies or applications or how to protect a computer against cookie attacks. Due to the fact that internet cookies are necessary for browsing or the fact that the cookie traffic is invisible to the computer user, a “cookie control” module is needed to help the user. That’s why, you need to have good internet security on your computer, which can detect both virus and spyware attacks.
Why don’t you contact our support team, we will check your computer’s configuration and we will install the best possible internet security. We can also provide you any kind of support for any of your computers at any time. Don’t miss it.
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