Cloudy with a Chance of Cyberattack: Understanding LOTC Attacks and How ZTNA Can Prevent Them

Cloudy with a Chance of Cyberattack: Understanding LOTC Attacks and How ZTNA Can Prevent Them

July 8, 2024 at 08:01AM

Cybercriminals have evolved from traditional Living Off The Land (LOTL) attacks to Living Off the Cloud (LOTC) tactics, exploiting trusted cloud services’ APIs to remotely control botnets and conceal malicious activity. To mitigate these risks, organizations should adopt a zero-trust approach, control access to cloud services, implement granular activity control, utilize DLP tools, embrace cloud-native security, change mindset, and provide awareness training.

From the meeting notes, the key takeaways are:

1. Living Off the Cloud (LOTC) attacks involve hackers abusing trusted cloud service APIs to remotely control botnets and hide malicious traffic as trusted cloud traffic.

2. The traditional Command and Control (C&C) infrastructure setup can be avoided by using cloud-based infrastructure components, providing an invisibility cloak to attackers.

3. To protect against LOTC attacks, organizations should consider implementing a Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) strategy, controlling access to sanctioned cloud applications, implementing granular cloud activity control, utilizing Data Loss Prevention (DLP) tools, adopting cloud-native security, changing the trust mindset, and providing awareness training to employees.

Overall, the meeting notes emphasized the need for organizations to adopt a zero-trust approach, restrict access to cloud services, and implement robust security measures to mitigate the risks of LOTC attacks.

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