Zero-Day Exploitation Zero-day exploitation uses a vulnerability for which the vendor has no patch yet, or does not know exists. The name says how much time the defense had to prepar …

Contractor Abuse Contractor access abuse arises when a consultant, a contractor, an external firm or a temporarily engaged person uses access more widely or for longer than the work requires. The access is often granted legitimately, but afterwards it is not monitored, not narrowed and not withdrawn in time.

Denial of Service / DoS DoS is a denial-of-service attack that tries to bring a service down or slow it so far that legitimate users can no longer use it. Unlike DDoS it need not come from a large network of compromised devices. Sometimes one source and a well-chosen vulnerability are enough.

Pretexting Pretexting is social engineering with a prepared story. The attacker does not simply send a link and wait for a click; they build a scenario in which what they are doing looks normal. They present themselves as a colleague, technical support, an auditor, a bank, a supplier, a courier or an official.

Privilege Escalation Privilege escalation is the attempt by an attacker who already holds some level of access to widen their rights in order to move through the network. Escalation is rarely the first stage — it comes after entry through, say, an ordinary user account or a compromised service. It takes the attacker from the crack they slipped through to control of the whole system. There are two directions: vertical escalation, from an ordinary user to domain administrator, and horizontal, moving from one account to another user's resources at the same level of rights.

Supply Chain Attack A supply chain attack does not always aim at the final victim directly. The attacker compromises software, hardware, a supplier, a build process or an update mechanism before the product or service reaches the user. The victim then carries the problem into their own environment, because it comes from a source they trust.

Third-Party Compromise Third-party compromise happens when the attacker does not go at an organization directly but at a supplier, a partner, a service provider or an external associate who already holds some form of trust and authorized access. Instead of forcing the front door, the attacker looks for a side entrance somebody else has already opened.