Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, malicious cyber activity has skyrocketed. Bad actors are trying to exploit remote workers, whose home setups usually have weaker cybersecurity than their corporate networks.

2020 has completely uprooted our lives. Many individuals have started working from home, which has led to organizations scrambling to address security vulnerabilities on their devices. The reason companies are working so hard to address these issues is to prevent attacks like those regularly seen in the news. Big names like Equifax, Target, and Sony have fallen victim to cyber attacks, but many other organizations are falling victim to “hackers” without any news coverage.

In the realm of public health, the term "hygiene” refers to conditions and practices that help maintain health and prevent disease spread, according to the World Health Organization. And in the age of COVID-19, this may include washing your hands, wearing a mask, and “social distancing.”

The scope of Ripple20, a set of 19 zero-day vulnerabilities, impressed even seasoned cybersecurity professionals. Not just because several of these vulns were “critical,” enabling remote code execution. But because, since the 1990s, this flaw has been embedded in hundreds of millions of Internet of Things (IoT) devices.

In March, 2020, Microsoft cryptically released information on CVE-2020-0796 — dubbed SMBGhost because of the effect it has on Server Message Block (SMB) v3.1.1. Cybersecurity teams scrambled to apply workarounds while they waited for Microsoft to release an official patch.