Spend a few minutes with Cigna CISO James Beeson and he'll list off an amazing number of factors impacting cybersecurity.
Where the threat landscape is increasing
Beeson uses an acrostic, spelling out DISRUPT, for the 12 areas where the cybersecurity threat landscape is expanding.
D: Data Analytics / AI / M2M
I: Internet of Things
S: Social Media / Fake News
R: Remote Access / Mobility
U: Ubiquitous Connectivity
P: Pictures & Video
T: Tech War Capability
But are these things really expanding the cybersecurity threat to businesses and individuals?
Absolutely, according to Beeson.
7 significant changes to the cyber threat landscape
"Here are examples of seven big changes—changes that show the threats are growing. For starters, the recent Ukraine power grid disruption. The cyber attack left between 700,000 and 3 million Ukrainians with no heat or power in winter. We don't know how many people died as a result," he told InfoSec leaders at the SecureWorld Dallas cybersecurity conference. The 2018 Dallas conference will be held October 10-11.
He then ticked off the rest of his list of seven things: the millions stolen using the SWIFT interbank transfer network, the Yahoo breach that impacted the sale to Verizon, the operational disruption of the WannaCry ransomware outbreak, DDoS attacks using bots from the IoT, fake news and technology used to re-direct how people think, and the emergence of Malware-as-a-Service (MaaS).
He believes a low global standard of living coupled with the need to survive will fuel growth in cybercrimes as billions more become connected to the internet.
“If you’re making $10 a day and you can make more using Malware-as-a-Service, or a syndicated crime syndicate offers you $20 a day to help penetrate networks, what are you going to do?”
These are just a couple of the insights from Beeson's keynote. Now we're looking forward to The Privacy Professor's keynote in October at SecureWorld Dallas 2018.
