#Middlebury #Cybersecurity
By JUSTIN GOLDEN
Cyber attacks for hire is one of the newest emerging cybersecurity threats, Kevin Jones writes in “Hacker Combat.” Big data is big money, the lifeblood of all for-profit business, and where data is, cybercriminals will follow.
Big data is the field that develops ways to collect and analyze information. It’s utilized to identify new or current consumers from extremely large sets of complex data to extract value from it for the sale of new services or offerings.
Cyber-attacks-as-a-service is similar to software-as-a-service (refers to something made available to customers through cloud computing), meaning applications, data and processing are done “in the cloud,” not on a local computer or network but remotely via the internet. This is a new phenomenon as the cyber threat landscape evolves and finds new ways to steal your data and then monetize it.
An article by Michelle Gibbs in “Cybint Solutions” lists the four industries most likely to get hacked. What is interesting is some of these industries don’t come to mind as likely candidates.
Small businesses are not an industry per se, but hackers are going small. Targeting of small- to medium-size businesses, those with 1,000 employees or fewer that make up 95 percent of the businesses in the U.S., is increasingly occurring.
Kelser Corporation reports 65 percent of cyber attacks now target small- and medium-size businesses. Large businesses have staff, process and procedures to fend off attacks. Smaller ones don’t. Cyber security isn’t on their short list for attention.
Small businesses are within the supply chain of large businesses. They connect to, communicate with and interact with those enterprises. If they aren’t focusing on cyber security, anyone in their supply chain up to and including the enterprises are at risk for an attack. Recall the celebrated hacking of Target. Hackers gained access to their HVAC vendor network credentials, which they stole. That vendor would monitor the environmentals in stores such as temperature ranges. If they moved out of a range they would contact the store manager to alert them.
The hackers gained access to their payment system network for credit card transactions from their point of sale terminals. They stole millions of credit card data. It’s not always you having to be cyber savvy but organizations within your supply chain too!
The healthcare industry is a target due to the extremely large amounts of personal data stored by medical entities such as doctors’ offices, their networks, hospitals, pharmacies and insurance companies. There is also the transformation underway of data from paper to digital format, e.g., electronic medical records.
The higher education industry is a target because they also store large amounts of personal data – Social Security numbers, addresses, dates of birth, student loans and bank account information. Those institutions also have laboratories and research centers that are connected too.
The energy industry is being attacked, too, with recent reported attempts on a small scale.
Stay informed. Educate yourself about what’s going on the cyber world to stay secure.
Golden Technology Services Inc. helps customers reduce their cybersecurity risks. Contact them at 972-679-9738 or justin.golden@gtscloud.com
