Cybersecurity and Cyberwar

http://blog.ted.com/2014/01/16/p-w-singer-on-cybersecurity-how-to-protect-yourself/

In his TED talk, military analyst P.W. Singer addresses cyber security and cyber war.

According to Mark Burnett, a security consultant, the main problem of cyber security, or security in general, are not the government or the industry, but the many individuals making use of technical devices connected to the internet. The government provides standards and enforces regulations and the industry adapts their products to these standards and regulations. The functionality of security systems depends, however, on how the consumers use these products. Apparently most of them do not care about their own security. At least this is what a study named “Perfect Passwords” suggested, which shows that the most common password was “password”.

It is therefore of great importance that the average user changes his attitude towards security. Though the internet might not be completely bad, there is a lot of criminality happening in this virtual world. This leads us to the realization that what we need is proper cyber education. We need to know how to properly use electronic devices without downloading viruses every few minutes.

Here is some of the advice given to internet users (by P.W Singer)

1. Access and Passwords
A good password should be regularly updated, long and consist of a mix of numbers, signs and letters. Using very easy passwords is as useful as not using any password at all, as several free software tools (Cain and Abel, John the Ripper) provide automated password-cracking. Also, the same password should not be used on various websites.
What is most important of all, however, is the fact that your e-mail password should be particularly strong, as you will receive e-mails when you reset all other passwords.

Of course passwords can only protect information up to a certain point, and there is still a high chance of them being cracked at some point, if somebody really attempts to crack them. Certain institutions, such as banks for example, therefore use multi-factor authentication. In multi-factor authentication more than one object or piece of knowledge is required. To access your bank account, for instance, you need to use your card AND type in your password. This of course, is not a 100% secure system…but it is more secure than only using a single password.

2. Systems and Equipment
Many security breaches in equipment are widely known and therefore patches for them are often available online, sometimes even free. By regularly updating browsers and in installing security updates countless cyberthreats can be avoided. Another task that could help protect users from cyberattacks is to secure wireless networks, as those are one of the main targets of cyberattacks. Given all these threats and the limited amount of methods to secure data, all data should be saved on an external hard drive.

3. Behaviour
Most threats to our computer systems enter through carelessness of its users. To avoid vulnerabilities of our systems, it is important to never open or download data from sources we don’t know or can’t verify. Of course it is also recommended to use the highest privacy and security settings available.

How you should behave on the internet?

According to P.W Singer it’s best to not be afraid, but to be wary