How does Deception Defense combat insider threats?

Deception Defense combats insider threats by deploying decoys, traps, and misleading information across a network to detect, deter, and analyze suspicious activities. Unlike traditional security measures that focus on perimeter defense or known attack patterns, deception technology assumes a breach may occur and uses lures to identify anomalous behavior early.

How it works:

1. Decoys & Traps: Fake servers, databases, or credentials are planted in the network. These mimic real assets but contain no sensitive data. When an insider (or attacker) interacts with them, it triggers alerts.
2. Breadcrumbs: Real but non-critical data (e.g., fake documents or login pages) is scattered to attract insider threats. Accessing these breadcrumbs signals malicious intent.
3. Honeypots: Isolated systems designed to engage attackers, delaying their actions while gathering intelligence on their methods.

Example:
A disgruntled employee attempts to access restricted financial records. Instead of finding the real database, they encounter a decoy with fake files. Their interaction is logged, and security teams are alerted to investigate further.

In cloud environments (e.g., Tencent Cloud), services like Tencent Cloud Host Security (HSM) or Cloud Workload Protection (CWP) can integrate deception techniques to monitor virtual machines, containers, or databases for insider anomalies. Additionally, Tencent Cloud Security Center provides threat detection and response, complementing deception strategies by correlating alerts from decoys with broader security events.

Deception Defense is particularly effective against insider threats because it doesn’t rely on the insider being careless—it detects intent, whether malicious or negligent.