cyberattack

noun

cy·​ber·​at·​tack ˈsī-bər-ə-ˌtak 

plural cyberattacks

: an attempt to gain illegal access to a computer or computer system for the purpose of causing damage or harm

An undermine-first strategy allows the United States government to intrude into adversaries' systems, exploiting this covert access to gather intelligence and occasionally to deliver a destructive cyberattack.

—Joshua A. Kroll

If your data is valuable enough, there is almost nothing you can do to provide total security against an expert adversary. Simply put, the attacker may be smarter than anyone you have defending the network. Cyberattacks are not only impossible to block, they're often difficult to detect; you may not even know you're under attack in the first place.

—Robert W. Lucky

cyberattacker

ˈsī-bər-ə-ˌta-kər 

noun

plural cyberattackers

Cyberattackers constantly evolve their skills and will always find new ways to attack—it's not a question of "if," but of "when."

—Eileen Dignen

Examples of cyberattack in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Shift To Dynamic, Context-Aware Access Recent cyberattacks reveal that static access controls are a liability. —Expert Panel®, Forbes, 28 Feb. 2025

The county did not respond to question of which services were impacted and whether this could be considered a cyberattack. —Matt Hubbard, Baltimore Sun, 24 Feb. 2025

The Zero Day cyberattack, which strikes on the afternoon of his meeting with Anna and takes her life, is the inciting incident that drags him back into the public sphere. —Rafaela Bassili, Vulture, 20 Feb. 2025

No sooner has this block of exposition concluded than a cyberattack cripples every system in the U.S.A., including all the ones that had been thought invulnerable. —Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times, 20 Feb. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1996, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for cyberattack

• ammoniac
• biofeedback
• counterattack
• demoniac
• elegiac
• noncardiac
• paranoiac
• aback
• anzac
• attack
• backpack
• backtrack