The browser has become the main productivity tool for employees. This is the reason hackers are zeroing in on browsers because employees need to use them to access corporate data, applications, services, and other assets. When you include policy infringements by these employees and increased attacks by those hackers zeroing in, you start to see why the browser has turned into the most serious threat to businesses. Most browsers are built using chromium (Chrome, Vivaldi, Edge, Brave, etc.) with Mozilla Firefox as the only alternative. This enables bad actors to hyper-focus on vulnerabilities on just two engines. In his article in Dark Reading, Michael Walter, President, and Co-Founder of Action1 Corporation wrote that “the problem is growing: In the first quarter of 2022 alone, Chrome fixed 113 vulnerabilities, 13% more than in the same period in 2021, while Firefox fixed 88 vulnerabilities, a 12% jump from the first quarter of 2021. These increases make browsers a top target for hackers.”
Browser Vulnerabilities
Add to this, that phishing is responsible for 90% of data breaches, and 83% of users run versions of Chrome that are vulnerable to zero-day attacks, and you have a recipe for a massive attack surface. Dark Reading’s article gives 4 steps to minimize risk from browser attacks:
- Make sure employees keep all browsers updated
- Enforce multi-factor authentication (MFA) on all critical systems and services
- Regularly clear the browser history on users’ machines
- Roll out an extensive cybersecurity awareness program that educates all your employees.
What the article doesn’t mention is a browser security solution like Seraphic where you don’t minimize the risk, you eliminate it. Not to say that the 4 steps to minimize risk aren’t great or necessary, they absolutely are, but they require a lot of change management, organizational oversight, and time. Seraphic is complimentary to these steps, as it is easy to deploy, easy to operate, and requires 0 change management to secure every browser, on every device, for every user, anywhere they are in the world. And Seraphic does that without replacing your existing browsers. Get in touch with us today!
