CYBERSECURITY
What Does it Do?
What is Cybersecurity? The world has become more increasingly dependent on technology than ever previously and as an outcome, more and more digital data is being created every day. Users, People and Government are increasingly relying on and storing massive amounts of data on computers/devices and transmitting it regularly across networks. Cybersecurity relates to the security threats and vulnerabilities that can occur when connected to outside sources (i.e the internet, networks, or the cloud.) and the related technologies and tools that can protect data from these threats. Cybersecurity must ensure that the Integrity, Confidentiality and Availability of data never becomes compromised. Cybersecurity involves an ever-changing set of risk management procedures, tools, training and best practices that are used to protect networks, devices and data from unwanted attacks. When exploited, these threats can have devastating outcomes for the health of an organisation or person (Forcepoint, n.d.).
Cybersecurity attacks can come in various forms. I will now summarise some of these threats:
- Phishing is one extremely common form of attacks which tends to be used when counterfeit emails are sent to purposely look like they came from the company they claim they are coming from. These emails tend to have attachments or links that have the intention of stealing sensitive data from the recipient’s machine (i.e. login information or credit cards). A lot of times these emails try to rush the user into making a quick decision so that they don’t have the time to check up on if the email is legitimate or not. These emails can also have hyperlinks in them where they are trying to direct you to log on to your banking on a mock-up site designed to look legit but instead is created by the attacker to steal your details (Phishing.org, n.d.).
- Social Engineering is another form of attack when people or users are manipulated into giving up their confidential information which could include banking details, passwords, or whatever they want. They can also use this to try to install malicious software that can take over the user’s computer and gain access to any of the information that they want. Offenders would rather try to fool the user into giving away their password rather than trying to hack their password as it an easier way to get the information (Webroot, n.d.).
- Malware generally comes in the form of software that can be quite malicious (Malware is a portmanteau of ‘Malicious Software’). This software that can infect computers can come in the form of viruses, Trojans, Worms, Spyware and more. Computer viruses are probably the most common form of malware and are named viruses because they tend to spread throughout a computer by continually copying themselves. Spyware can also be extremely dangerous as it does what the name entails and spies on the user, finding out passwords and credit card numbers and transmitting them back to their host (Kaspersky n.d.).
- Ransomware is another form of Cybersecurity threat that comes in the form of intrusive malware. Ransomware can infect the user’s computer in many ways, one way it gets in is from phishing spam emails (as discussed earlier). Once the ransomware is downloaded into the computer, it starts to encrypt the user's files and computer, and then the attacker will send a message and demand a ransom from the user to restore the data and the system to how it was previously (Josh Fruhlinger, 2020). Victims are normally shown written instructions on the computer screen on how to pay the ransom normally paid for in cryptocurrency (i.e. Bitcoin).
What is the Likely Impact?
Cybersecurity threats are expected to rise over the next few years, the International Data Corporation suggests that spending across the globe on cybersecurity solutions could rise to $133.7 Billion by 2022 (Kaspersky, n.d.). The potential of data being stolen can have devastating consequences. In the year 2019, The FBI suggested a reported loss of over 3.5 Billion dollars over 467,361 complaints of breaches of cybercrime (FBI, 2020). One thing worth noting too is that cybersecurity threats are rising year by year as evidenced by a 25% increase in ransomware cases from 2018 to 2019 (Parker, 2020).
As with the growing demand for technology, no one is completely safe from cybercrime, experts predict that it will continue to affect people more and more. Currently, people use a multitude of devices to check their bank balances, surf the internet, use email, and connect with others. We as a society are getting more and more reliant on technology, therefore we are also increasingly more and more at risk of exposure to cybercrime (Giles, 2016). With the COVID-19 pandemic occurring at the start of 2020, a lot of people had the option of working from home through the use of technology. Studies suggest that one in six Australians were the victims of cybercrime just in this period alone (Williams, 2020).
Cybersecurity as a field of employment is expected to rise continuously over the next decade. Worldwide, the cybersecurity market amassed a worth of USD 74 billion in 2015 and they believe it will more than double its worth to USD 172 billion by 2020 (Institute of Data, 2019). Australia in 2019 was short of around 2,300 cybersecurity workers and that figure is expected to rise to 17,600 by 2026 (Institute of Data, 2019). According to a report from Cisco from 2015, cybersecurity skills are in demand with the field being in short supply. In 2015 there were a million jobs in demand for cybersecurity and that figure is expected to rise with the demand for skills (Cisco, 2015).
How Will This Affect Us?
We use technology for a plethora of things today. There has been a great change in how we conduct things like banking in the last decade or so. There has been a growing demand to move services like this online to make people's life easier. Previously you would have to physically go into the bank to do things like transfer money, open an account or apply for a loan but now a lot of these services have been transferred online (Roy Morgan 2013). Banking is not the only service to move online, along with things like just buying your groceries has shifted to the online world. So we need these services to be secure as possible, as a lot of sensitive information can be processed through examples like this.
No one is completely safe from cybersecurity when it comes to individuals, businesses, national, or even worldwide. Identity theft can be a devastating crime to happen to someone. A hacker could get someone’s details and start to fraudulently pose as the victim to access things like bank accounts or other benefits (ACSC, 2020). An example of cybercrime could be if a nation interfered in another nation’s election or democracy (Hoffman 2020). In 2019, the Australian government had a case of malicious activity being conducted on the Australian parliament computer networks (Brangwin, Portillo-Castro, n.d.).
In the future, we will need to take the threat of cybersecurity very seriously as it can have extremely devastating effects on our lives. People are increasingly sharing information about their daily lives as well as giving away their data and it could be quite easy for a hacker to exploit this (Chandler, 2019). I have always tried to keep my life away from the digital world, keeping away from services such as social media. However, the threat of cyber related crime is always out there and is a force that may be here to stay.