Government

Data breaches have become so common at this point that the mere fact that a government agency such as the South Carolina Department of Revenue loses several million Social Security numbers and credit card numbers isn’t really that noteworthy. It’s another day in the life of the Internet. But what is remarkable is that there are organizations out there that are not deploying encryption technologies to protect personally identifiable information because it’s complicated. Really?

While the eastern United States recovers from this week’s devastasting storm, the nation’s Homeland Security chief used “Superstorm Sandy” to promote the importance of national cybersecurity protection.

The FBI says it is now making a push to not just stop cybercrime but to identify the attackers behind the phishing, credit card fraud and other campaigns that cost consumers and enterprises billions of dollars each year. The bureau is the lead agency charged with addressing cybercrime in the U.S. and has a large division dedicated to the problem, but it mostly has been concerned with stopping ongoing attacks rather than tracking down the criminals themselves. That appears to be changing.

A Southern California judge has rejected several key claims in a class-action lawsuit filed in response to Sony’s handling last year of a data breach that left millions of users at risk.In a ruling released by Courthousenews.com, U.S. District Court Judge Anthony Battaglia ruled users did not have an expectation of “perfect security” when they signed on with the company’s PlayStation Network.

Hoping to better address the cause and concerns of cyber attacks on a state level, last week the National Governors Association (NGA) announced the creation of the Resource Center for State Cybersecurity, an initiative set into motion by Governor Martin O’Malley (D-Md.) and Governor Rick Snyder (R-Mich.)

Scared is a strong word, but the reality, according to a Websense analysis by Patrik Runald, is that spear-phishers, like the ones that compromised a White House network last week, are implementing new evasion tactics, fundamentally changing their attack strategies, and revolutionizing the targeted threat model, giving business executives plenty of reason to worry.

It can happen to anyone…and when it does it usually catches everybody – the victim and his relatives – completely unprepared. I’m talking about kidnapping. Twice in my life I’ve been involved in helping the police track down and arrest gangs of kidnappers. The first case didn’t directly affect me or my family, but the second time a close friend of mine was kidnapped. And it turns out that our work in tackling cybercrime can also be useful to catch criminals who seem to have little connection with high-tech wrong-doing.