Honeypot, Honeynet, Honey File or Honey Token?

About this interactive

Deception means making someone believe something that is not true. Deception technology sends an adversary to a system built for them, so they think they have hacked the network when they have not, and defenders can watch what they try and how. Disruption is the other half: it interrupts the attack by steering the adversary away from the systems that matter. The forms differ in size and in what they are: A honeypot is one decoy system, a desktop or a server, set up to trick adversaries. A honeynet is a whole decoy network: separate machines, networking equipment, perhaps firewalls. A honey file is a decoy file, such as a document no one has a reason to open, watched so that opening it raises an alert. A honey token is fake data planted among real data. The lesson's example is a fake customer in a database, with an email address the company owns. If mail ever arrives there, the database was stolen. Fake credentials and keys work the same way: the alert comes when they are used. To sort a card, ask what the decoy is: a system, a network, a file, or a piece of data.

What you'll learn

Tell four deception technologies apart: a honeypot (one decoy system), a honeynet (a whole decoy network), a honey file (a decoy file that alerts when opened) and a honey token (fake data that reveals theft when it is used)
Explain how deception and disruption technologies divert an adversary and reveal their tactics, and how a honey token shows that data was stolen

Aligned to

CompTIA Security+

1.2 Summarize fundamental security concepts.

Key terms

Deception Technology: Security tools and techniques that create decoy systems, files, or networks to mislead adversaries and observe their tactics.
Honeypot: A decoy system or network designed to attract and detect attackers while logging their activity.
Honeynet: A decoy network of systems designed to attract attackers and monitor their behavior across an entire simulated environment.
Honey File: A decoy file placed within a system to detect unauthorized access by attracting and tracking adversary interaction.
Honey Token: A piece of deceptive data or a digital artifact placed in a system to detect unauthorized access or misuse by attracting and tracking attacker activity.

Topics

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