In recent years, the game industry has flourished, and gamers have also grown exponentially. Hundreds of millions of gamers around the world enjoy a wide range of interactive experiences in online games. The preferred target for its exploits.
The gaming industry is an attractive target for cyber attackers for a number of reasons. After all, online games generate tens of billions of dollars in revenue globally each year, making them lucrative targets for financial gain. At the same time, the huge user base of gamers provides hackers with a large amount of personal information, which can be used for identity theft and other malicious purposes.
And because users often wish to modify their games with mods, cheats, or other third-party programs, this further expands the attack surface for cyber hackers. Due to the fierce competition in the gaming industry, some players will receive generous bonuses for successful BUGs, which gives attackers an incentive to use cyber attacks to crack and ensure that they beat their competitors.
In addition to popular online gaming, the industry also includes gambling and online betting, which attackers can use as a way to manipulate bets or gain insider knowledge of bets or odds. Accounts on these sites often contain bank information in order to receive payments, so this is very valuable information to the ATO or data theft. The gambling industry is also subject to politically and morally motivated attacks. For example, in China, because the country strictly prohibits gambling, some hackers will block gambling websites through DDoS or DNS.
In addition to hacking and competition, the industry has also been the target of other common attacks such as ransomware. In 2021, CD Projekt Red, which produced the popular games "The Witcher" and "Cyberpunk," suffered a ransomware attack that leaked internal data including source code. The breach caused significant delays in project releases and had financial repercussions for the company. The implications of releasing source code and internal data could result in companies losing important intellectual property and could have serious security implications for popular games. The value and popularity of gaming sites make them a common target for attackers.
DDoS Attacks: Greatly Destroy Players ’ Gaming Experience
Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks are a common threat in the gaming industry, and these attacks involve flooding a target network or server with so much traffic that the target cannot process legitimate requests, resulting in service disruption. Attackers may target gaming networks with DDoS attacks for financial gain, revenge, or simply to cause confusion and disrupt the user's gaming experience.
Since the gaming industry relies on a stable internet to play multiplayer games and load high-quality content, any network disruption can have serious consequences.
Also for sportsbooks, a reliable internet connection is essential for betting on time. During the 2022 World Cup in December last year and the NBA Finals in May 2023, sports betting sites were very frequently targeted. In addition to disrupting operations, DDoS attacks can also act as a smoke screen to distract attention from other, more serious attacks.
The second half of 2022 will see a noticeable increase in app DDoS attacks against protected gaming sites. This is because popular games are often released during this period, and the amount of DDoS attacks often increases.
In 2020, popular Western game company Ubisoft won a lawsuit against internet attackers who sold software to conduct DDoS attacks on servers running the Rainbow Six: Siege game in order to disrupt matches and try to gain an advantage, and players often Utilize this DDoS software to avoid losing games and ruining online rankings. These services are often referred to as DDoS-for-hire, bootstrapping, or pressure services and are common in the gaming industry. These services allow anyone to rent DDoS attack capabilities in a user-friendly format and allow people without technical skills to carry out attacks on game servers. This allows users to win easily by disrupting the game or forcing opposing players to disconnect, which could also be an attempt to retaliate against perceived cheating or other slights.
DDoS attacks, often used for rent-out, have become a common threat in the gaming industry. Attackers may also opt for a network DDoS to try and cause maximum disruption, rather than an application targeting a specific game function.
Securing the Gaming Industry: Web Application and API Protection
Web applications and APIs are an integral part of the gaming industry, powering everything from online multiplayer gaming experiences to in-game purchases. However, these technologies have always had vulnerabilities that attackers can exploit. Attackers target the gaming industry with various motives: to steal user data, gain unauthorized access to gaming systems, or disrupt services. So web application and API security is critical to ensuring the security of the gaming industry and protecting user data.
In 2022, the most common attack in the game industry is cross-site scripting attack, accounting for 32.2% of all attack types. The root cause was a targeted attack on a popular online role-playing game in June 2022. XSS can be a common threat in the gaming industry, as the prevalence of user-generated content provides an opportunity for attackers to enter malicious script. Last year's top-ranked CVEs were mainly remote code execution vulnerabilities, such as Log4Shell (CVE-2021-45105 and CVE-2021-44228), as well as Oracle and ThinkPad bugs. While these vulnerabilities could allow attackers to take control of game servers, steal data, and run cheat codes for profit during gameplay, other zero-day vulnerabilities found in specific games could be exploited to access user data or manipulate gameplay.
Social engineering attacks are also common in the gaming industry. The online communities, virtual chat rooms, and messaging platforms used by many players are vulnerable to social engineering attacks. The anonymity allows hackers to impersonate game officials, or even gaming platforms, in an attempt to obtain credentials and other valuable information. information.
APIs (protocols that allow programs to interact with each other) are another common attack vector, and they are vulnerable to threats such as shadow APIs, or APIs that are not documented and maintained by normal IT management and security processes, but not removed, and business logic abuse Threat to gaming sites. In 2022, 28% of all API traffic in games will go to API endpoints marked as shadow APIs. These forgotten and unmaintained APIs provide attackers with access to the rest of the network, which can be disastrous. Gaming companies may be more vulnerable to API threats because they often deal with sensitive data such as user credentials and financial information. In addition, game companies are more likely to use APIs to provide game services, making APIs an attractive target for attackers.
Another common attack on APIs is business logic misuse. Business logic attacks account for 65% of all API attacks, and they attempt to exploit flaws in application logic, posing a huge threat to gaming and gambling sites. These attacks may target online gaming mechanics, payment portals, user interactions, or other means of compromising gaming and online gambling operations.
Impact of Malicious Bots and Automation Attacks on Gaming
Malicious bots are automated software programs designed to perform malicious tasks, such as scraping data, launching DDoS attacks, or exploiting vulnerabilities in web applications and APIs. Bots can wreak havoc on the gaming industry by stealing user data, disrupting services, and manipulating in-game economies. Attackers use bad bots to target gaming industry for financial gain, competitive advantage.
We usually divide bots into three levels: easy, medium, and advanced. Simple bots use automated scripts to connect to websites and do not self-report as browsers, while moderate bots emulate browser technology and advanced bots mimic human behaviour.
In 2022, most bot attacks will come from simple bots, accounting for 55%. Because common game attacks like spam, DDoS, or in-game currency mining can be written fairly simply and require less complexity than more in-depth attacks. Moderate bots (7%) have a higher proportion on gambling sites, as these sites require more specialized attacks.
Account takeover is another common bot attack that uses stolen credentials to gain access to an account with the goal of revealing valuable information. ATOs are common in the gaming industry, as many black market sites convert stolen game accounts, virtual items, or in-game currency into real-world currency. Additionally, gaming sites often have lower security measures than sites such as heavily regulated online banking accounts, giving attackers a lower barrier to entry. As the chart below shows, there has been a steady increase in the number of gaming credentials sold on hacking forums over the last year.
ATO attacks peaked during the holiday season, likely due to increased online activity and high demand for gaming-related gift products.
Conclusion: The economic success and large user base of the gaming industry make it a prime target for cybercriminals. They use various attack methods, including DDoS, web application and API attacks, and malicious bots, and by understanding the motivations and methods behind these attacks, gaming companies can protect the network and ensure the safety of the industry. By remaining vigilant and implementing strong cybersecurity measures, the gaming industry can continue to thrive and provide enjoyable experiences to gamers around the world.