What is Defacement
1 Definition of Defacement
Defacement is an unintended change in a website, application, or other digital interfaces. Defacement disturbs users from having benefited from our site.
1a Web Defacement
We already know that website is a dynamic interface. Many code, text, images changes or updates happen there. This dynamic also has another side in form of changes that arise without intention or plan. Even worse, the unintended change was happened due to an attack from hackers.
This hacking activity is genuine. Being hacked is not about 'what', but it is a matter of time. It does not arise in the security domain but also in performance and user impression. Note to ourselves that being hacked not only change the visual interface, but webpage defacement may also impact business performance.
1b Signs of Hacked Website
Some indications that your website may just have been hacked:
- The content is being weird
- Web performance decreased drastically
- There is suspicious activity on our webpage
- The website is broken
- Presence of Malware
1c Understanding Hacker's Behavior
Hacker's behaviour is not suddenly in disarray. They tend to have a specific pattern. After observing for several weeks, we found that every time they just hacked a webpage, one or more subsequent behaviour rise:
- Posting on their social media
- Providing digital signature in targeted webpage
- Leaving their alias to be recognized
- Campaigning a political propaganda
- Provoking with profanity
1d Uses Cases
Defacement is real. We can point out several use cases regarding hacktivism:
- Defacement on Government Site
- Defacer Attack on Religious Site
- Defacement on School Site
- Fake News in Crowdsourcing Site
2 How to Detect Defacement
If we have an Early Detection System, it will only cost us a little money rather than a bad reputation. Due to cleaning up the broken perception or brand is highly expensive. It is not the move we wanted.
Upon we do not have an early detection system, we will detect defacement when our internal team or potential buyers report that they cannot continue the buying process or other activities on our website.
The deployment of (link) Site Monitoring tools can provide the functionality of an early detection system. SentryPage is one of tools to conduct site monitoring.
3 How to Prevent Defacement
Knowing all above insights, we better prevent defacement in the first place. Here are several activities to protect our site and reputation: