Business top brass are terrified their companies will simply be collateral damage in a future cyber-war

Businesses are worrying about being caught in the crossfire of cyber warfare, according to research from Bitdefender – while industry figures warn that the gap between common-or-garden cyber threats and “oh, look what nation states are doing” is becoming ever smaller. Bitdefender’s latest report, titled 10 in 10, surveyed …

[IceC0ld]

so NOW they want to take cyber seriously

we who work within IT any ANY level are probably aware that it doesn't take much to push a Co out of action. WE lost access to VPN recently, NOT an attack, just bad whatever :o)

took a day to recover, and we lost everyone working from home from L1 through L2 L3 just two people missed it, and we were effectively TOAST for that one day

but are the Co looking to attempt to ensure our response is better, our VPN is more robust ............. ?

No, they just carry on, say, whoo, we were lucky there and that's it

we have never been able to get anyone to take IT security seriously until it's too late

and THEN, it's IT's fault ffs

talk about Catch22 :o(

I DREAM of the day that software that is secure BY DESIGN is a thing, and is an EXPECTED thing

when admins say we can't do that, because it opens us up to xy+z dangers, AND PEOPLE LISTEN

until then, I have you

so buckle up buttercup

'cos these rants are probably not going away any time soon :o(

[IGotOut]

Re: so NOW they want to take cyber seriously

Time to find a new career.

I was like you, had a breakdown. Quit. Got a lower paid job...much happier.

Even the threat of redundancy is "meh" compared to living with that shit day in, day out.

[cosymart]

Any War

In all wars there is collateral damage, why should a cyber-war any different? The probable good thing about a cyber-war is that the collateral damage is less likely to kill people.

[IGotOut]

Re: Any War

Unless it takes down phone lines, poisons water supplies or messing with the electricity supply.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Re: Any War

They said "less" likely, just like police with truncheons, tazers and rubber bullets are less likely to kill or permanently maim people than those armed with lead bullets.

[amanfromMars 1]

Re: Any War

In all wars there is collateral damage, why should a cyber-war any different? The probable good thing about a cyber-war is that the collateral damage is less likely to kill people. ..... cosymart

Cyber-warfare targets the Virtual Machine Systems most likely to kill people. Acceptable collateral damage would be its enabler operands on pilot pilotless missions which/who choose to not threaten to turn capabilities fire on both vital and virtual home base assets in order to stop cyber-warfare targeting the Virtual Machine Systems most likely to kill people ...... and even perversely, liking killing people.

That's a Renegade Rogue Virtual Killing Machine System humans might like to certainly do without, harboured in their midst, and preying on live prized assets.

What say y'all? A legitimate target for Wilful Machine Deconstruction with or without Weapons of Mass Destructive Assistance? Don't be coy now, for you are being asked for your honest opinion about a matter than directly affects everything and everyone living on planet Earth ...... and beyond too ........ so it is neither really unimportant nor virtually inconsequential.

[Anonymous Coward]

Cyber woah

There has been one major cyber war incident to date, which is what you should look at to see what a state-on-state cyber war looks like... see what happened to Estonia in 2007.

The purpose, like any initial strike on physical infrastructure, is to throw the entire country into disarray - which makes it weaker when your tanks roll in.

Arguably, that incident was as crippling as the 1999 "Operation Allied Force" against Serbia. Although the difference is that one came back when the attacks stopped, the other one required years of physical rebuilding.

Widespread civillian chaos does indeed dent any business, few will have come through unscathed from either event.

Not quite sure how either scenario can be used for "normal" business planning though. Both are war and normally off the scale for civillian business disaster planning (during peacetime).

[EnviableOne]

Vivre The Cyber Squirrels

They got Nuts!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Vivre The Cyber Squirrels

Also Germaine.

[ShadowDragon8685]

> Oddly, a fifth thought “legal fines” would be one of the most critical outcomes of cyber warfare waged against their employers.

Naturally. It frankly seems certain that these companies are NOT in compliance with the relevant regulatory authority's requirements, and have no intention of putting themselves in compliance, because they deem the costs of implementing compliance are too high and/or their profits rely on not complying. In the usual course of things, all is business-as-usual, until some hack comes along and exposes how noncompliant they were.

It's pretty much the same as what I always say about labor laws: the laws are on the books, but without active and ongoing investigation only when malfeasance is reported can it be enforced.

Basically, if you want your cyber-laws to have any real bite, you need to deploy a department of government hackers dedicated to hacking all and sundry companies to find out if they are breaching your laws, and then fine the bajeezus out of them, just like if you want your labor laws against things such as wage theft to be enforced, you need to employ regulators with "legend" type undercover identities to roam the land, taking on low-end jobs such as waitstaff, retail associate, etc, work a few weeks to a month in the shoes of a drudge, and then move on, only months later for the employer to get regulatory beat-down and curb-stomping for the wage theft, employee abuse, etc.