Security

Google detects anywhere between 600-800 new malware infected websites per week. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to online threats.

A majority of phishing attacks now use links rather than file attachments to get past antivirus applications and other forms of cybersecurity. They also send users to fake online login forms designed to steal their password for platforms like PayPal and Microsoft 365.

Online security can be a real problem for businesses and one that often slips through the cracks. Spoofed sites are prevalent, and they’re designed so well that most users can’t tell them from the real thing.

Malicious websites can be just as much of a threat to mobile devices as they are to desktop and laptop computers. They also can inject a device with malware as soon as the site loads in the browser, before the user can react or click the “back” button.

How can you protect your business from online dangers? By deploying DNS filtering.

How Does DNS Filtering Work?

DNS filtering is also called web protection because it protects users from dangerous online websites.

DNS stands for Domain Name System, which is the mechanism that matches a website server’s IP address to its commonly known URL (i.e. the www.something.com address).

Without the DNS system people would have to know the exact IP address of every website they wanted to visit, making the web pretty difficult to use. When a domain (www) name is purchased for a website, it’s assigned a unique IP address according to the name server the site is residing on.

This translation of the domain name you type in the browser to the IP address of the site all happens automatically behind the scenes when you visit websites. What a DNS filter does is put itself in between your device and that system so it can check the validity of the site before loading it into your browser.

DNS filters access a blacklist of malicious websites and use predefined policies to detect any potential security violations on a site. If it finds that a site is malicious or potentially dangerous, instead of sending the user there, it will redirect their browser to a warning page.

DNS filters can either be set up to allow users to bypass the warning or to block the content completely so users can’t bypass the security to get to the site.

Why Your Business Should be Using DNS Filtering on Your Devices

DNS filtering is often included in many network solutions, such as firewalls or VPNs. The threat landscape online has only become more dangerous, which is why you need to protect your users from landing on malicious sites.

Here are key reasons to put DNS filtering in place.

Prevents Data Breaches

According to Symantec, 1 in 13 web requests lead to malware. That’s a pretty high percentage when you consider the number of websites you visit every day.

Going online has become like walking through a minefield, you never know when you’re going to hit a malicious site or a legitimate site that’s been hacked and had malware injected.

DNS filtering puts an important safety barrier in between your users and all those dangerous websites.

Stops Malware & Ransomware Downloads

Cybercriminals set up malicious websites to download a malware file as soon as the site loads in a user’s browser. This means that if they try to leave after getting to the site, it’s often too late.

Because a DNS filter will block malicious sites even after a user clicks a link to one, the site never loads in the user’s browser, thus it stops those auto-downloads of malware.

Helps Prevent Credential Theft

Credential theft has become #1 form of phishing attack. Hackers are looking for that easy entry into a cloud service which bypasses multiple security protections, the user login.

Users are often fooled into clicking a link they think is for “an urgent password reset” or another phishing tactic. They land on a page that spoofs the look of the legitimate page and their credentials are instantly stolen.

DNS filtering can detect these types of spoofed login pages and keep users from making that critical mistake that exposes their login.

Keeps Inappropriate Sites Off Company Devices

One wrong click can cause a user to accidentally load an inappropriate site. This can be particularly embarrassing if they’re sharing a screen during a video conference.

DNS filtering allows companies to block certain sites. These can include inappropriate sites or productivity draining sites (like social media). This gives you more control over the types of web content that can be accessed through company devices.