Abstract
Cyber-attacks have become commonplace in the world of the Internet. The nature of cyber-attacks is gradually changing. Early cyber-attacks were usually conducted by curious personal hackers who used simple techniques to hack homepages and steal personal information. Lately, cyber attackers have started using sophisticated cyber-attack techniques that enable them to retrieve national confidential information beyond the theft of personal information or defacing websites. These sophisticated and advanced cyber-attacks can disrupt the critical infrastructures of a nation. Much research regarding cyber-attacks has been conducted; however, there has been a lack of research related to measuring cyber-attacks from the perspective of offensive cybersecurity. This motivated us to propose a methodology for quantifying cyber-attacks such that they are measurable rather than abstract. For this purpose, we identified each element of offensive cybersecurity used in cyber-attacks. We also investigated the extent to which the detailed techniques identified in the offensive cyber-security framework were used, by analyzing cyber-attacks. Based on these investigations, the complexity and intensity of cyber-attacks can be measured and quantified. We evaluated advanced persistent threats (APT) and fileless cyber-attacks that occurred between 2010 and 2020 based on the methodology we developed. Based on our research methodology, we expect that researchers will be able to measure future cyber-attacks.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 7738 |
Journal | Applied Sciences (Switzerland) |
Volume | 11 |
Issue number | 16 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2021 Aug 2 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:Funding: For Kim, K, and Alfouzan, F.A, this research received no external funding. For Kim H.K, this research was funded by the Korea government (MSIT).
Funding Information:
Acknowledgments: This research was conducted during the work as an Assistant Professor at Naif Arab University for Security Sciences (NAUSS), for Kyounggon Kim and Faisal Abdulaziz Alfouzan. Furthermore, We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Naif Arab University for Security Sciences (NAUSS) and the president of the university for his consistent support and encouragement. For y Huy Kang Kim, this work was supported by Institute of Information & communications Technology Planning & Evaluation (IITP) grant funded by the Korea government (MSIT) (No. 2021-0-00624, Development of Intelligence Cyber Attack and Defense Analysis Framework for Increasing Security Level of C-ITS).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
Keywords
- Cyber-attacks
- Offensive cybersecurity
- Offensive cybersecurity framework
- Scoring model
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- General Materials Science
- Instrumentation
- General Engineering
- Process Chemistry and Technology
- Computer Science Applications
- Fluid Flow and Transfer Processes