How Retailers Can Protect Themselves from Cybercriminals
Cyberattacks can drive e-commerce businesses into ruin. But how can you defend yourself? Here’s how to fight back against identity theft, fake vouchers, and other attacks.
Fake Gift Cards
An easy trick for hackers: Buy several gift cards from their intended victim and try to figure out the algorithm behind the code. Once cracked, attackers have free rein to generate their own gift card codes – using them personally or selling them.
How can you defend against this? – Use complex algorithms. Never underestimate your adversary. Also, only activate gift card codes in your online store after they’ve been purchased. That way, hackers have no chance with their counterfeit currency.
Fraudulent Refunds
Peak season is approaching again, and this type of attack is most dangerous and most common during this time – so be prepared.
An invoice for a product that was never ordered, or an order that was placed but the customer claims never received. It’s hard to believe, but many retailers don’t notice until it’s too late. During peak season, retailers often lack both the capacity and technical tools to verify every claim, and money quickly slips away.
There are both complex and simpler solutions. Thoroughly verifying who bought what and tracking shipments is labor-intensive but pays off in your year-end balance.
To make this process more efficient, integrate interfaces with other systems or external partners to automate and verify which deliveries were actually made and who the real buyer is.
DDoS Attacks (Blocking Online Shops)
The goal of a DDoS attack (Distributed Denial-of-Service) is to temporarily disable an online shop. Attackers achieve this by flooding the site with an extremely high volume of targeted requests. This overload blocks the service, potentially causing significant damage to retailers during high-traffic periods like Black Friday or Christmas.
There are two ways to defend against such attacks. Scalable cloud infrastructures allow companies to quickly scale up resources and defend themselves with additional capacity. Second, comprehensive monitoring combined with an incident response plan helps. This plan outlines exactly what steps to take in an emergency, so the right measures can be initiated as soon as an attacker is detected.
Key Facts
Cost per incident: A successful phishing attack costs companies an average of 4.76 million Euro.
Social Engineering: 98 percent of all cyberattacks involve at least one form of social engineering.
Frequently Asked Questions
Every question is locked. A tap unlocks the answer.
What’s the difference between data protection and data security?
Data protection governs the lawful handling of personal data (legal basis, purpose limitation, individual rights). Data security includes the technical and organizational measures to protect all data from loss, manipulation, or unauthorized access.
Does every company need a Data Protection Officer?
In Germany, a Data Protection Officer is mandatory if at least 20 employees regularly process personal data using automated systems, or if special categories of data (e.g., health data) are processed.
What rights do individuals have under the GDPR?
The right to access, rectification, erasure, restriction of processing, data portability, and the right to object. Companies must respond to requests within one month.
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TL;DR
- Cyberattacks can push e-commerce businesses into bankruptcy.
- Fake gift cards: A simple trick for hackers – buy several cards from the target and reverse-engineer the code algorithm.
- Once cracked, attackers can freely generate, use, or sell counterfeit gift card codes.
- Fraudulent refunds: As peak season approaches, this attack becomes more frequent and dangerous – prepare accordingly.
