What Is Web Security?

Definition of Web Security

Web security is a broad category of security solutions that protect your users, devices, and wider network against internet-based cyberattacks—malware, phishing, and more—that can lead to breaches and data loss. Many web security solutions reduce the security risk to your organization when your users accidentally access malicious files and websites.

In the traditional web security model, a “stack” of security appliances at an internet gateway inspects traffic that passes through it, including some combination of firewall inspection, intrusion prevention system (IPS) scanning, sandboxing, URL filtering, and various other security and access controls.
 

Web security vs. web application security

Before we continue, let’s clarify these terms. Web security can also include web application security (also called website security), a subcategory of practices and tools that help secure public-facing websites. For the purposes of this article, we’ll be focusing specifically on web security solutions that secure servers or user endpoints as well as the traffic that moves between those and the internet.

What’s the purpose of web security?

The massive importance of the internet for modern enterprises—and the accompanying growth in the sophistication, frequency, and impact of cyberattacks—has made web security critical to business continuity. It’s your first line of defense against threats that can lead to the exposure of sensitive data, costly ransoms, reputational harm, compliance violations, and a host of other consequences.

Once the domain of mostly small-time hackers, internet-borne threats have evolved into a massive black market business that touches the worlds of organized crime as well as state-sponsored espionage and sabotage. Some of the latest threats are incredibly sophisticated, able to easily fool the untrained eye or bypass legacy security. Plus, with an array of ready-made tools, exploit kits, JavaScript modules, and even fully developed campaigns for sale, even a novice actor can easily launch an attack.

Cybersecurity Ventures estimates that, by 2025, global cybercrime will cost cost US$10.5 trillion annually—a greater profit than the entire world’s major illicit drug trade—and half the world’s data will live in the cloud. Given what’s at stake, it’s easy to see why effective web security is so important today.

What are the benefits of web security?

For a modern enterprise, effective web security has broad technical and human benefits:

• Protect your business and stay compliant by preventing loss of sensitive data
• Protect customers and employees by securing their private information
• Avoid costly service interruptions by preventing infections and exploits
• Offer a better user experience by helping your users stay safe and productive
• Maintain customer loyalty and trust by staying secure and out of the news
   

Great strides in cloud and mobility technology let your employees and customers connect with you with unprecedented ease and flexibility. Unfortunately, that cuts both ways, and attackers have more ways to approach your organization’s wider attack surface. With the right web protections in place, you can spend more time taking advantage of the benefits, and less worrying about security threats.

What does web security protect against? 

Web security casts a wide net to protect users and endpoints from malicious emails, encrypted threats, malicious or compromised websites and databases, malicious redirects, hijacking, and more. Let’s look at a few of the most common threats in more detail:

• Ransomware: These attacks encrypt data, and then demand a ransom payment in exchange for a decryption key. In a double-extortion attack, your data is also exfiltrated.
• General malware: Countless variants of malware exist that can lead to anything from data leaks, spying, and unauthorized access to lockouts, errors, and system crashes.
• Phishing: Often carried out through email, text messages, or malicious websites, these attacks trick users into things like divulging login credentials or downloading spyware.
• SQL injection: These attacks exploit an input vulnerability in a database server, allowing an attacker to execute commands that let them retrieve, manipulate, or delete data.
• Denial of service (DoS): These attacks slow or even shut down a network device such as a server by sending it more data than it can process. In distributed DoS—that is, a DDoS attack—this is carried out by many hijacked devices at once.
• Cross-site scripting (XSS): In this type of injection attack, an attacker introduces malicious code to a trusted website by entering it in an unprotected user input field.

The ideal web security solution leverages multiple technologies to stop malware and ransomware, block phishing domains, restrict the use of credentials, and more—building a holistic defense.

Let’s look in a bit more detail at how this works.