Saturday, December 20, 2014

More Discussion about Cybersecurity.

It is possible and probable that snooping, phishing, spoofing, and other forms of hacking will just become more de rigueur since this major hacking, again, of the giant SONY's computing / data facilities and some other observations that have made their way into the public eye, even more so now than before :  That people do these things as there is no virtue in them really, save for instance for oversight and rule - making and enforcing purposes, when they have the ability and time available (for everyone in fact) to proceed in these activities, sometimes for the purposes of one's own amusement.  How could this be -- breaking and entering a house might now be the same as simply "hacking" another's computer.  Why?  The house in question, and it might be your house, is so full of computing appliances, controls and other devices that change your living environment and then that report to a data center, for example, that almost everybody's home is a danger point if one worries about controlling access to data on any level. 

Certainly security, and internet and computer security are important for everyone including especially property owners; and even including those who rent their homes, workplaces, vehicles and so on.  What is the to - do really if data and information products, and the information in them is properly designed and used in this information commons that we all have as part of the totality of the internet?  There should not be, save for the internet has become a haven for things that are not just simple and innocent M2M electronics and communication :  This internet of things is a place of the drudgery of proper computer operations, applications and systems; and data gathering and storage - typical technological scope here, though also, and in greater part, the "Internet of Things" is a place of electronic hazard, chaos and even mayhem that causes in many ways corporations and society to be shaken badly when things are not and do not go right.  The SONY hacking situation is one such
annoying and disconcerting example of this sort of thing and the thing that has people angered is the actual hackers will never be caught and they use rogue situations and computing power to allow for such things, very negative and destructive in the least.  The disconcerting and unsettling, angry thing about this is it's more and more frequent, and occasionally a large - scale business is affected by this sort of thing and the silent alarms connected to the internet of things call out and officials and the like just scratch their heads, waiting for IDS reports and the like, probably.  The process of countermanding such things is prohibitive as we are all still learning about this type of technology and its use and only "experts" really understand the accents and inflections of the science of computer intrusion and hacking and they pay themselves pretty well by the various events same create and cause havoc and annoyance with under the circumstances. 

There is currently some discussion among the leaders in the IS community about changing the structure and infrastructure of telecommunications and wired and wireless technology that makes it so easy for some individual or individuals to wreak havoc on everyone, essentially first as a scare tactic and then to really hold us all hostage, perhaps through some integration of hacking efforts to utilities and other activities, in the end in scandals and crimes that will corrupt even best efforts to use the web properly and in the way free people want it to work.  Something must be done with how computers and machines and the like communicate and talk to each other -- and without suggesting an overall change that might make everyone angry due primarily to the work involved and the expenses as well :  Hacking defenses can be built in to devices and so forth that are telltale of where the attacks are from and that these details are not made available to more people is additionally disconcerting and in some respects a public safety issue as much as when some party in the old days would use the neighbors' telephone to gab about you and your long vacation and so on.  Remember as well the ERM and smaller risk frameworks we are all in that have us calculating chances of adverse events upon leaving for work each day, or even stepping out of doors when it's misty or foggy, or in warmer weather even.  The effects of the recent hack on SONY are over - burdensome psychologically and without a doubt due to this have destroyed at least a few private executives, the individuals on their coattails, their overseers, and other stakeholders such as those charged with a watchful eye to such things and their oversight and the way they activate their defenses to protect first a business and then all of us from the annoyance of lost, corrupted, stolen, deleted and destroyed data and so on.  We now need among corporate America and its regulators and other stakeholders concerning these sorts of things, a kind of computing "Elvis", or "Spiderman", or similar iconic ideal and deterrent that will just tell the offenders to cram it systemically then next time anyone tries such a thing.  In you all our hopes rest, what with all the education and other activities that will lead to this, again, ideal out there and the feasibility of it.  By this column and its writing to - day, I do solemnly and solely at first, and without dismissing the kind of objectivism that might be necessary here, propose these fighting words against hackers and their ilk.  "Okay"? 

No comments: