US businesses can help defend against unprecedented cyber-threats now targeting the private sector says WILLIAM HUTCHISON.
In their analysis of foreign threats, Mandiant went on to warn that Russia could seek to use criminal actors against NATO nations as a means of reprisal, conducting potentially disruptive operations against financial entities, relying on wiper attacks and ransomware as means of disruption. This means executing an in-depth approach to understanding their networks, assessing what legitimate executables should be running on all devices and ensuring alerts are triggered when unusual file behavior occurs. Educating all employees and making staff hyper-aware of possible threats through ongoing training and unannounced drill exercises also ensures the identification and reporting of damaging and corrupting phishing attacks.
Knowing where critical systems and data reside within organizations also helps develop business continuity and disaster recovery plans. Data represents a substantial percentage of business value, so its protection needs to be a top priority. After the loss of highly confidential corporate data, the reporting, lawsuits, negative publicity, fines, loss of market share, drops in stock prices, and reputational injury, means the lasting damage is extremely costly. Businesses must expect the unexpected and be confident that they can return to full operations as quickly as possible, thus reducing the impact of the incident.
The Future of Cybersecurity
As the number and sophistication of data breaches and cyberattacks continue to rapidly develop, the2022 World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Global Risks Report listed cyberattacks on global critical infrastructure as a top concern. Yet the intelligence gained around how Russia implements cyber tactics to execute nation-state attacks can be harnessed to help organizations assess their cyber readiness and better prepare for future attacks. It has become clear nation-state attacks are no longer limited to governmental operations, but instead have become more frequent and far-reaching.
The Foreign Policy Research Institute has warned that the world needs to find ways to respond to Russian cyberattacks not only during a shooting war but also to the persistent attacks that form their ongoing hybrid war against the West. Cybersecurity, therefore, needs to be treated as an integral tool in the fight for democracy.
- Hutchinson is CEO and co-Founder of SimSpace, starting the cyber-readiness platform in 2015 to deliver military-grade cybersecurity protection against advanced cyber threats for governments and organizations worldwide.
