Security Issues, Risks and Vulnerabilities of a POS System
In 2013, the credit card information of about 41 million Target clients was endangered in one of the most crucial data breaches in history. The following year, up to 56 million Home Depot customers were affected by a similar violation. In both cases, the attackers gained access to the credit card information of those customers through their point-of-sale (POS) systems.
POS systems are an essential component of virtually every physical business involving the transfer of cash for products or services. Modern POS devices are capable of processing transactions, managing inventory, recording orders, and linking to other point-of-sale systems. However, the numerous POS-related data breaches and safety problems that have happened in recent years reveal that POS systems are vulnerable and may be in danger to attacks.
What are the substantial risks and vulnerabilities of a POS system? And how do you protect your company whilst reaping the advantages of using POS systems?
Sources
Main Types of POS System Vulnerabilities
Malware
Malicious software designed to damage computer systems -- is just one of the substantial tools hackers use while attacking POS systems. By way of example, the Target POS breach included malware which might have been discovered and nullified if a high quality anti-malware system was implemented earlier.
How it works: Malware can get onto your computer system by means of a tactic called phishing. Hackers usually embed malicious hyperlinks in authentic-looking emails for workers to click on them. Clicking on these links, however, frequently triggers the installation of malware to the worker's computer, which then provides the user easy access to it.
Thus, your employees must know about the danger of clicking on suspicious links in suspicious emails. Vigilance, on their part can go a long way in preventing the installation of malware on your computer systems.
Running older versions of Microsoft Windows or other operating systems may also pose POS security problems and risks because most manufacturers don't provide security patches for obsolete operating systems. Cybercriminals can easily exploit such unpatched systems to obtain access to POS data. Thus, updating to newer versions of operating systems is a critical best practice to prevent POS security problems .
Additionally, it is imperative that POS information be encrypted and decrypted if necessary. But, such encryption information needs to be kept in a location separate from where user information is saved. A hardware security module is a helpful tool that permits you to store encryption data separately and attach it to your servers or computers if you will need to get POS data.
VPN services provide secure encryption of all traffic that flows to and from the POS device. But you must use a high quality VPN service with unbreakable encryption and other useful security and privacy features. You can locate a reliable VPN service that will serve your needs at vpnpro.com.
A potentially costly mistake some companies make is sending security upgrades and system upgrades to POS devices over corporate networks. The danger with this is that if hackers gain access to the corporate network, they can easily access your POS data.
Most organizations enable multi-factor authentication in the corporate network to the POS device for a workaround to this issue. However, large businesses create separate pathways in the corporate community to the POS devices when providing such upgrades. Though this is a more secure solution, it can be costly and hard to configure.
Ram Scraping
Ram scratching is another technique used by hackers to steal credit card info from POS devices. Cybercriminals attempt to rip data from such devices before they can be encrypted on the business's network. Although it is fairly old-fashioned at this time, it may be dangerous if proper security measures aren't taken.
Ram scraping can be avoided by maintaining your key POS system elements isolated from the corporate community. You can even prevent these systems from communicating with unknown apparatus by speeding up your firewalls.
Other easy-to-implement steps may also be taken to improve security on POS systems. By way of instance, many overlook the value of changing the default manufacturer passwords on such devices. However, cybercriminals have managed to access lists of default passwords in the networks of those manufacturers. Thus, it's sensible to change the default passwords instantly you connect the device to your applications.
Purchasing genuine POS devices from respectable companies is critical as fraudulent devices exist which can provide cybercriminals with easy access to all of your customer data.
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Conclusion
Maintaining a POS system protected from cybercriminals can be hard because of the huge array of known and unknown vulnerabilities which may be exploited. What is more, hackers continue to create new malware and approaches to steal precious POS data.
Therefore, businesses that use point of sale systems must make POS safety a priority. These systems manage sensitive information, and information breaches can be quite costly. Implementing the steps outlined above can lower the chance of being affected by a data breach.
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