Amazon prevents, analyzes cyberthreats with automation
Amazon is utilizing advanced automation to simultaneously provide cybersecurity and collect data on hacking methods.
In a corporate blog post, Amazon highlighted a what until now has been a little-known project called “MadPot.” Initially launched in the late 2010s, MadPot uses intelligence gained from network sensors, as well as threat disruption based on Amazon Web Services’ (AWS) network controls and cooperation with other Internet companies.
How MadPot works
Leveraging MadPot, Amazon maintains tens of thousands of threat sensors monitoring more than 100 million daily attempts to connect with digital decoys it places to attract cyberattack attempts. Amazon analyzes all the data gathered through these interactions to better understand the cyberthreat landscape and the way in which it fortifies its cloud infrastructure.
MadPot sends automatic requests to Internet hosting sites asking them to block or remove any of their customers found to be involved in malicious activity. Amazon also produces updates to its security infrastructure based on findings and learnings from MadPot data.
“It’s become the main source for gathering threat intelligence and malware samples across Amazon,” Sharifi Mehr, principal security engineer, AWS and original inventor of the MadPot concept, said in the blog post. “Deploying it across our huge global infrastructure enables us to push the limits of what’s possible to protect our systems and the hundreds of millions of customers who rely on us to help keep them secure.”
“We basically make the whole internet a safer place to operate by running this system,” said Mark Ryland, director for Amazon Security, in the blog post. “MadPot’s detection and disruption capabilities give us a powerful one-two punch to alert customers of potential threats and often stop cybercriminals in their tracks.”
Amazon fights online fraud
In an exclusive interview with Chain Store Age, Dharmesh Mehta, Amazon VP of Selling Partner Services, discussed methods Aamzon uses to prevent and mediate cybercrime. The e-tailer employs a team of more than 12,000 people globally, including machine learning scientists, software developers, and expert investigators, dedicated to protecting its site and customers from fraud and other forms of abuse.
During 2022, Amazon initiated takedowns of more than 20,000 phishing websites and 10,000 phone numbers being used as part of impersonation schemes. The company also referred more than 100 bad actors across the globe to local law enforcement authorities.
In addition, Amazon has adopted email verification technology across more than 20 countries in an effort to make it easier for customers to identify phishing emails and harder for scammers to commit fraud.