Cyberattacks targeting vital information such as personal data are a significant blow for big companies as they often leave them in a vicious cycle of legal proceedings.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has now come to the rescue by luring hackers into taking the wrong data. According to ArsTechnica, the FBI’s new program known as IDLE (Illicit Data Loss Exploitation) asks the company to plant “decoy data,” confusing crooks looking to steal valuable information.
While there is not much information on how the program will actually work, officials say that the decoy data will be placed with the existing data structures, making it appear more genuine.
The goal is not to lure hackers but to make their stealing operation more challenging than ever. Since the IDE data will be mixed with exiting data, it will be challenging for crooks to find anything useful before altering the authorities.
Concerns about the FBI’s program
A primary concern remains that the FBI will have to take in the company’s real information in order to produce fake data. However, an official claims that the bureau doesn’t retain info and will procure information based on concent.
While all this might sound like the perfect firewall, many experts are skeptical about the whole program. First and foremost, why does the FBI want to get into the data protection in the first place?
Even if companies give the FBI benefit of the doubt, experts are also questioning the effectiveness of the new approach. Each company follows different security measures, and the new approach will only help if the company has a robust underlying security system.