The Cyber-Security Threat

If you have read most of my blogs, you know that I am critical of speakers, especially keynotes. Usually it is a commercial, an advertisement for the company they work for, which is total crap. Who wants to sit through that?

Chris Richter, Level3 SVP of Global Security Services, did a great job as the keynote for Microcorp’s One on One event. He talked about the very real threat of cyber-security. It is a heavy weight prize fight. Nation states are involved. It is high stakes because it is about Money.

Richter said that the Dark Web is 85% of the traffic on the Internet. It has cash transactions in excess of the drug war.

Ransonware is a 10-person company that makes $60 Million per year. There is revenue attached to cyber-crime. That makes it more tangible if you will. Certainly more motivation.

It isn’t just marketers who ruin everything. Hackers turn your own gun on you. Every piece of software to check a system has been used to enter a system. Boom!

Richter gave some sold advice: Practice good data hygiene. For an experiment, the NSA dumped flash drives in a parking lot to see how many people and employees would use them. Almost all. All contained a program to call home and alert the NSA.

Humans are the weakest link in security. Social engineering is how hackers get around most security. Change passwords often and do not share them with anyone!

You can’t patch stupid! (You have to fire stupid.)

Highlight slides:

Cyber security highlights from RAD-INFO, Inc.

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The periodic table of cyber-security start-ups from CB Insights. It is a chart of the 121 companies, VCs, corporate investors, and acquirers defining the cyber-security industry.

Tags: level3, microcorp, security
Related tags: cyber security, security, cyber, richter