What Happened Before the Breach?

A major insurance provider is reeling from a catastrophic data breach. Sensitive customer data, including personally identifiable information (PII), policy details, and financial records, has been compromised. Trust is eroding, regulatory fines are imminent, and the company is left scrambling for answers. But how did it happen? To fully understand, we must walk through each stage of the breach, analyzing what traditional security logs missed and how packet data could have stopped the attack before it escalated.

As we dissect the breach, we’ll explore the gaps in log-based security and how network packet data could have provided the depth of visibility needed to prevent the compromise.

Step 1: The Fallout

What Happened

Regulators, customers, and internal stakeholders are demanding answers. A surge of fraudulent insurance claims and identity theft reports point back to a breach in the insurer’s database. Cybercriminals have accessed policyholder records, exposing millions to financial and reputational harm.

• What logs provided: Logs detected an increase in database queries but failed to correlate this with unauthorized data exfiltration.
• What packet data could have provided: Packet data would have shown the exact customer records being accessed, the methods used to bypass security controls, and the specific payloads being transmitted, allowing security teams to halt the breach before significant damage occurred.

Step 2: The Data Exfiltration

What Happened

Long before the breach was discovered, attackers exfiltrated sensitive data in small batches to evade detection. They leveraged encrypted traffic and compromised application programming interfaces (APIs) to siphon policyholder information over an extended period.

• What logs provided: Logs flagged large database requests but lacked insight into the content being transferred, leaving analysts blind to the actual threat.
• What packet data could have provided: Packet data could have revealed the exact nature of the encrypted traffic, detecting irregularities in API communications, packet timing, and the destination of exfiltrated data and enabling early intervention.

Step 3: The Lateral Movement

What Happened

After breaching the insurer’s web portal, the attackers moved laterally across internal systems, escalating privileges and compromising databases that stored customer and claims information.

• What logs provided: Logs recorded login attempts and permission changes but failed to detect the attacker’s malicious activities across multiple systems.
• What packet data could have provided: Packet data could have identified abnormal authentication sequences, unauthorized API calls, and communication between previously unrelated systems, providing early warning signs of lateral movement.

Step 4: The Initial Compromise

What Happened

The breach began with a malicious insider, a disgruntled employee who sold access credentials to cybercriminals. With valid user credentials, attackers bypassed many traditional security measures.

• What logs provided: Logs showed standard user activity, making it nearly impossible to distinguish the attacker’s actions from legitimate employee behavior.
• What packet data could have provided: Packet data could have detected unusual outbound data flows, unauthorized access to restricted records, and patterns of communication indicative of a compromised account, alerting security teams to the insider threat.

What Could Have Been Done?

Throughout this attack, packet data could have provided visibility that logs simply could not. Although logs offer a high-level view of system activity, they often miss the critical details of who accessed what, when, and how. Packet data, on the other hand, offers:

• Granular insight into data movements to detect exfiltration in real time
• Deep inspection of encrypted traffic to uncover hidden threats
• Forensic investigation capabilities to trace every step of the attack

Could This Happen Again?

Insurance companies must ask themselves: Are they relying solely on logs, or are they leveraging the full power of packet data to safeguard policyholder information? The next breach could already be in motion; only by listening to the network can they stop it before it’s too late. Are you putting yourself at risk?

Learn how NETSCOUT Omnis Cyber Intelligence can help by providing comprehensive network visibility with scalable deep packet inspection (DPI) to detect, investigate, and respond to threats more efficiently.