The term “honeypot” has long been used to describe strategies that employ bait to lure someone or something into a trap. In centuries past, it might literally mean that you left a pot of honey in the woods to attract a bear (presumably to shoot it). In more recent times, honeypot is frequently used when discussing private investigators, law enforcement, and even international espionage. While the bait changes depending on the scenario, the result is that someone is duped into doing whatever it is that the trap’s organizers intended.
In cyber security, the functions of a honeytrap deviate from its traditional meaning in a couple of significant ways. As you might imagine, there’s no real honey involved. Also, there usually isn’t direct contact with a human target. Instead, the traps function entirely in the virtual world.
The purpose of a honeypot trap or honeypot email is to entice nefarious people into accessing a controlled environment. This gives experts the chance to observe the criminals’ methods, identify potential weaknesses in their systems, plan for future threats, and boost security protocols. In some ways, it’s like an old-time hunter putting a giant pot of honey in his cabin, closing all the doors and windows, and then observing a grizzly bear’s attempts to breach the cabin in order to spot any vulnerabilities in the structure.
But enough about bears. We’re here to talk about cyber security. And in these situations, the chosen bait is a digital asset, software, server, or network that is tantalizingly unsecured. Criminals seeking sensitive data and access to your systems simply can’t resist the opportunity to venture into the decoy.
The specific elements of the honeypot trap vary dramatically between various use cases. The common denominator is that the vulnerability isn’t obvious, which would alert the criminal to the trap. Instead, it’s a believable weakness that is just enough to entice someone to try to exploit it.
What is a honeypot trap’s purpose other than revealing various cybercrime tactics? It also derails the criminals from their other nefarious tasks, potentially sparing you and others from damage that could otherwise be inflicted. Any amount of time that a criminal spends in a honeypot trap is time they won’t be threatening the actual system.
You may find yourself wondering what is a honeypot email address, what is a honeypot in network security, or what is a honeypot website? All of these elements are part of cybersecurity tactics used by experts in nearly all industries. Because cyberthreats are so diverse in their form and function, there are many different varieties of honeypots available to combat them.
Let’s take a closer look at several of the main types:
Research honeypots: As the name implies, these traps are all about research and learning. The honeypot lures in a criminal who then reveals their tactics and helps the administrator to prevent future threats.
Production honeypots: Learning is important, but sometimes the main priority is just helping your current workload to progress unimpeded. Production honeypots accomplish this by drawing invasive actions away from the real network. You’ll still gather useful insights in the process, but these traps usually focus on the functional side of things.
Email honeypots: Spammers often target email addresses with malicious messages that can trick the recipients into taking actions that could compromise their network’s security. With honeypot email addresses, a dummy email address is used to collect potentially damaging messages. These traps have both research and production purposes, as experts can learn a lot about the current threats through the collected data, as well as draw attention away from legitimate email addresses.
Database honeypots: Databases are subjected to cyber-attacks on a grander scale than email addresses, so these traps are designed to lure criminals into artificial databases. While firewalls are still in place with database honeypots, they’re weak enough for intrusions to occur.
Malware honeypots: These traps are specific to application programming interfaces (APIs) and software apps. The goal is to detect malware in action to then shore up API defenses and develop stronger antimalware software.
While these various types of honeypots share similarities, it’s important to understand their distinct strengths so you can apply them with maximum effectiveness. Speaking of which, let’s take a closer look at the overall benefits and weaknesses of honeypots.
There are no perfect solutions in cybersecurity, and every honeypot involves an array of considerations. In addition to identifying vulnerabilities and drawing criminals away from your valuable assets, here are some of the benefits that you will generally experience with the use of honeypot email addresses and other honeypot traps:
Low cost: Honeypots are designed to work almost autonomously, saving your team time and money. Because the software is often open source, it’s affordable to acquire and use.
Stop insider threats: While outside forces always pose threats, it’s internal employees who are sometimes the most difficult to detect. Honeypots can help you address internal risks before they become full-on disasters.
Keep up with the latest evolutions: Even the world’s most secure network as of today could become compromised next month if it’s not updated, because cybercriminals are constantly refining their tactics and finding new ways to cause chaos. Honeypots enable you to spot these updates and proactively find defenses.
Lower chance of misidentification: Honeypots generally can’t be accessed by your regular customers and employees, ensuring that only criminals are ensnared. Reducing false positives will maximize your efforts and give you more confidence in your findings.
Secure your emails: Knowing how to create an email honeypot is crucial because it enables you to spot malware and other email-based dangers. Based on what your trap catches, you can improve your security and train your employees.
Of course, all forms of cybersecurity have their limitations and potential drawbacks. So what is a potential risk of using a honeypot? Let’s look at some of the weaknesses that might come with using this security strategy:
Can be easy to spot: Cyber criminals deal with honeypots on a regular basis, so they look for tell-tale signs to tip them off. It takes talent to make a trap that has appealing vulnerabilities without being too obvious. There are even honeypot detectors that give criminals better chances of spotting a trap before they make the mistake of engaging with it.
Might compromise your security: Honeypots are supposed to be used separate from your main system or network, but in some cases a talented criminal could potentially gain access through the trap. It’s imperative that any traps you employ are truly isolated and allow no doorways into your organization.
Can be used as a distraction: Just as an organization hopes their honeypot will lure criminals away from their assets of value, a criminal might use decoy activity within the honeypot to conceal an actual attack on the organization. So it’s important that your overall security is top-notch and you don’t place too much emphasis on the trap itself.
Can cause issues for your email marketing: Your email sender reputation could actually be damaged if a spam bot or cybercriminal were to enter a honeypot email address into your website and you then attempted to send messages to that account. Even in more benign cases, like when a real user simply inputted their email address incorrectly, the result is the same. For this reason, it’s important to use double opt-ins and clean your email lists on a consistent basis.
While it’s important to be aware of the possible drawbacks of honeypot traps, they are typically outweighed by the benefits. As long as you entrust your security to an expert, they’ll be able to mitigate the risks and bring the most benefit to your organization.
It’s essential that your strategic partners provide the security and resources needed for modern business success. For example, Twilio SendGrid offers robust security for your email campaigns. You also get tools to help you keep your email lists accurate and up-to-date, which is essential to weeding out potential honeypot email addresses and protecting your sender reputation.
Open a free account today (there’s no credit card required) and you can see for yourself how Twilio SendGrid not only streamlines your communications, but also makes it easier to keep your email databases secure.
