Posted: January 31st, 2022

Detection and Protection of Systems From Software or System Vulnerabilities

Detection and Protection of Systems From Software or System Vulnerabilities
Ensuring that a system is free from vulnerabilities is a constant challenge. This is even more so in large, complex computing environments that depend on a myriad of software and hardware configurations. However, IT security professionals and hackers alike can leverage and exploit system vulnerabilities.

Discuss the importance of detecting and protecting against system or software vulnerabilities. Also, discuss and provide an example of how hackers exploit system and software vulnerabilities to conduct an attack.
Discuss the importance of detecting and protecting against system or software vulnerabilities.
The detection and protection of systems from system and software vulnerabilities is fundamental for protecting personal and organizational systems from cybersecurity threats (Team Tenable, 2020). Malicious attackers exploit these vulnerabilities as their entry points into the system configurations. This unauthorized access allows them to access and retrieve sensitive or confidential information which can be used against the system owners. Therefore, detection and prevention measures will enable the system users to take preemptive actions for these vulnerabilities before being exploited by the hackers. Generally, the hacker who uses the vulnerabilities successfully determines particular approaches depending on their objective. They could access specific files or run particular programs, which gives them accruing control and data. Consequently, the initial openings could end up being intrusion points into large sensitive networks (Holt, 2017). Therefore, implementing detection and protection mechanisms will ensure that the authorized users can identify any vulnerabilities and protect them earlier.
Also, discuss and provide an example of how hackers exploit system and software vulnerabilities to conduct an attack.
One common vulnerability is the improper manner of dealing with inputs supplied by a system user. When the inputs are not correctly processed before using them within a program, they could lead to unexpected system behaviors. This could lead to a buffer overflow with fixed-length buffers where some data gets written beyond the boundaries of the present defined capacity (Jimenez et al., 2009). This causes system malfunctioning as the new data could corrupt the data from other buffers or processes. The buffer overflow could hence be used for injecting malicious code, and the program’s execution sequence could be altered or the injected code to be executed. The hackers take complete control of the system.

References
Holt, T. (2017, May 22). What are software vulnerabilities, and why are there so many of them? Retrieved from https://theconversation.com/what-are-software-vulnerabilities-and-why-are-there-so-many-of-them-77930
Jimenez, W., Mammar, A., & Cavalli, A. (2009). Software vulnerabilities, prevention and detection methods: A review1. Security in model-driven architecture, 215995, 215995.
Team Tenable. (2020, April 20). How to protect yourself from software vulnerabilities. Retrieved from https://www.tenable.com/blog/how-to-protect-yourself-from-software-vulnerabilities#

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