Network monitoring is a normal part of the daily security of just about every organization. It is part and parcel with watching over a network to make sure that threat actors don’t find a way in. But do organizations and their security teams pay attention to dark web monitoring? Are they even aware of the traffic that could be coming to their networks from the dark web?
According to Techradar’s Robert Fitzsimmons, “the vast majority of organizations are not actively monitoring traffic originating from the dark web.” This is traffic that is making it as far as the public-facing networks such organizations use. If Fitzsimmons is correct, organizations have reason to be alarmed.
Why Dark Web Monitoring?
At first, one might think that it’s not necessary to single out dark web traffic as long as all incoming traffic is properly monitored. After all, does it matter where threats originate from as long as they are stopped in their tracks?
As Fitzsimmons correctly points out, there is no ‘good’ traffic originating from the dark web. It is all bad. The dark web is a haven for all sorts of malicious and illicit activity. Any and all traffic coming from it is automatically suspect.
There is a reason for conducting regular dark web monitoring, especially where understanding incoming traffic is concerned. Monitoring the dark web is proactive. It is a strategy of looking for potential threats before they are actually launched.
Monitoring the dark web is like sending out recon teams to find out what the enemy is up to before a large-scale attack can be mounted.
Also Read: £9M Funded by the UK Government to Fight Dark Web Crime
Searching Everywhere on the Dark Web
DarkOwl is an industry leading darknet data intelligence firm offering some of the most popular dark web security solutions. It’s all about data at DarkOwl, and they look everywhere. DarkOwl and its competitors continually scour the dark web searching for:
- Stolen and leaked credentials
- Compromised account information
- Proprietary corporate data
- Government data
- Threat actor chatter
- Signs of emerging threats
Continual dark web monitoring helps organizations identify if and when their data has been published online. Doing so is important in the fight against cybercrime. But equally important is paying attention to chatter.
Threat actors discuss what they are doing on the dark web. If security teams can figure out where they are discussing things and what is being talked about, they are better equipped to identify threats at the earliest possible stage.
Some Traffic Is Worse Than Others
This all takes us back to monitoring incoming traffic based on origin. It is true that all traffic needs to be monitored to maintain network security. But it’s also true that some traffic is worse than others. The reality is that dark web traffic is inherently more dangerous than traditional traffic.
Dark web traffic originates from threat actors, hackers, rogue nations, and sophisticated groups of cybercriminals who have leveraged the power of the internet to apply their respective trades. Why would a security team not want to know about incoming traffic originating from the dark web?
Also Read: Reasons Why You Should Use The Darknet Market
A Puzzling Question
After reading what Fitzsimmons had to say on the topic, I am left with a puzzling question: how is dark web monitoring not at the forefront of every security team’s cybersecurity strategy? The dark web is the location from which most cyber threats originate. Failing to monitor it is like failing to spy on the enemy in traditional warfare.
Monitoring one’s network is crucial to cybersecurity. It is most effective when security teams are paying attention to traffic origination. So why are so many organizations ignoring dark web traffic?