What is a Dark Web Assessment?
In our Dark Web Assessment, we find out the availability of sensitive, private, or potentially damaging information about an organization and related accounts, systems, and people. We discover this information in dark web marketplaces, forums, and exchanges. We search open-source intelligence (OSINT) from social media platforms, websites, and known cybercriminal hot spots such as Pastebin or Shodan. Your employees might be unknowingly involved in a data breach that can put your organisation at risk.
Potential findings include:
- Breached usernames & passwords extracted from third parties or the company itself;
- Remote access to business resources listed for sale on dark web sites;
- Personal accounts of key people – such as board members or top managers – which criminals have breached;
- Regular auditing, alerting, and assessments based on changes in discoveries and activity levels over some time.
CloudTech24 offers an in-depth, realistic, and personalised dark web solution.
Our highly educated experts receive training in both intelligence harvesting and tactical cybersecurity, so we prepare your business against the newest threats. We give you round the clock accessibility to our platform, notifying you of the latest threats and malware trends.
Our threat intelligence research involves searches of forums and breached databases to discover up to date threats. Dark Intelligence is vital to align your approach to security with the latest attacks.
CloudTech24 scans wireless mapping networks in your geographic location. We discover your wireless hardware address. We may find out if your WiFi .cap file has been uploaded to networks for hacking or if your WiFi password is known.
We use a combination of talented counter-intelligence operatives and specialised tools to carry out a reconnaissance operation, which will determine if cyber criminals have compromised your data. We will give you a report containing the results of the searches we have performed, and a risk analysis with recommendations.
CloudTech24 uses unique keywords to monitor the Dark Web to discover if your company information has leaked out in the past. We can tell if cybercriminals are selling your business information on the black market. We have exclusive technology partnerships that mean we can detect current instances of company data on the Dark Web.
What is the Dark Web?
The Dark Web consists of websites that exist behind layers of encryption. This secrecy means you cannot find them using search engines like Google or traditional web browsers like Safari or Chrome.
Sites on the Dark Web hide who they are using an encryption tool called Tor. Tor can conceal your name and your online activity. It can make it appear that you are in a different Country from your actual one.
If you want to visit a site on the Dark Web, you have to use Tor. Your IP address is bounced through many layers of encryption to appear to be at another address. The website you are visiting is also not where it seems to be. You cannot work out who is behind these secret sites very quickly.
There are alternatives to Tor, such as I2P, but all these encrypted browsers use the same principles. The user has to use the same encryption tool as the site they are going to and know where to find it so they can type in the URL.
There are famous examples of Dark Web sites such as The Silk Road and Dream Market. These sites sell drugs and other illegal items like weapons and forged documents. Criminal gangs and child pornographers also use the Dark Web. The Silk Road was set up in 2011 by Ross Ulbricht. Purchasers bought things with Bitcoin so that their online identities could be protected. The FBI caught Ulbricht in 2013, and he is now serving a life sentence in a New York prison.
Some people use the Dark Web more legitimately. Those in totalitarian states can use it to communicate with those outside of their country. Some members of the public want to keep their online activity secret from the government, which may be snooping on them. It is a brilliant way to stay anonymous online. You can have access to cut-price goods like electronics and secret social media platforms.
You may find some users referring to the Deep Web. Often this term means the same thing as the Dark Web. The Deep Web technically means all the websites that search engines cannot find. In addition to Dark Web sites, the Deep Web also includes user databases, webmail pages, registration-required web forums, and pages behind paywalls. Many of these sites are not illegal and used by legitimate companies.
All websites on the Dark Web have randomly created URLs that change all the time. You will see their suffixes all end in .onion rather than .com or .co.uk. The website addresses are hard to remember so that the content is confidential and anonymous.
Surfing the Dark Web is not illegal, but it comes with many risks and can expose you to malware.
Does your Business Need a Dark Web Assessment?
The Dark Web is a place filled with cybercriminals who may sell your data to those trying to profit from your business. If you have information like passwords and email addresses on the Dark Web, you could fall foul of cyberattacks.
A cyber attack could ruin your company. Hacking costs you money, and you could be fined further for breaches of data. Your company also receives terrible publicity, and you could lose customers.
Every business is at risk from cybercrime.
How do you do a Dark Web Assessment?
There is a solution to cyberattacks, and CloudTech24 can provide it for you. We give you a comprehensive Dark Web Assessment, searching thousands of classified sites with automated intelligence.
We check botnets, criminal chat rooms, peer-to-peer networks, malicious websites, secret blogs, bulletin boards, and black-market sites to identify, analyse, and find your organisation’s compromised or stolen customer information. Cybercriminals can take all kinds of data from your company:
- Email Addresses
- Passwords
- Dates of Birth
- Addresses
- Drivers licenses
- Security numbers
- Payment card details
- Bank details
- Answers to security questions
Our evaluation also protects your externally facing devices by looking for any mention of known vulnerabilities or information from your organisation’s public IP addresses.
The information you gain from our detailed assessment protects you from cybercriminals. Successful cybersecurity needs you to be proactive, solving issues before they become a problem. If an attack has already started, it is doing untold damage to your company. You need to stop it now before the criminals begin.
We can also find information about key employees in your organisation. These individuals’ private data is often targeted by criminals to make money.
How do I Protect my Business with a Dark Web Assessment?
You should now feel ready to protect your company from cyber attacks. CloudTech24 is waiting to help you with a Dark Web Assessment.
We can tell you all you need to know about protecting your business from online threats.
Common FAQs about our UK Dark Web Assessments
Please see below for some common questions on our Dark Web Assessments, if you would prefer to speak to someone then pick up the phone and speak to one of our team at our HQ.
WHAT IS THE DARK WEB?
The Dark Web, Deep Web or Dark Net (Dark Network) are all common terms used interchangeably for a part of the internet that users cannot navigate in the same way as typical web browsing and are not indexed by general search engines.
HOW TO ACCESS THE DARK WEB?
The dark web must be accessed using an anonymising browser called Tor (The Onion Router), the most common access method involves the usage of TOR browser or Brave browser.
HOW TO USE THE DARK WEB?
Once connected to the dark web it can be navigated similarly to the open web or internet, by using a specialist search engine or clicking links on other sites.
IS IT ILLEGAL TO GO ON THE DARK WEB?
It is not illegal to access the dark web, however many illegal services and products can be bought there, such as weapons and stolen bank details.
HOW TO CHECK IF MY PASSWORD HAS BEEN LEAKED?
Speak to CloudTech24 about a dark web assessment today!
CAN THE DARK WEB BE MONITORED?
Yes, one of the many great services CloudTech24 provides is ongoing monitoring of the dark web to identify any compromised credentials or PII relating to your domain.
WHAT DOES PII STAND FOR?
PII stands for personally identifiable information.
WHAT IS PII?
PII data can include any data that is personally identifiable, such as: first name, last name, address, date of birth, passport number or credit card details.
WHAT DOES GDPR STAND FOR?
GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation.
WHAT IS GDPR?
A regulation in EU law regarding data protection and privacy as well as the transfer of personal data outside of the European Union and UK.
