Cyber Sins: Part of the Human Condition Permanently
October 24, 2020
Business operations have secrets and maybe sins. Medium explains “The Seven Deadly Sins Of Cybersecurity.” Using the metaphor of the biblical seven deadly sins: greed, gluttony, lust, envy, sloth, wrath, and pride, the article compares social media platforms to the digital manifestation of them. The write up argues that cybersecurity is demonized by seven deadly sins.
What’s a sin?
Covid-19 has made cyber security more important than ever as people are forced to work from their homes. Organizations need cybersecurity to protect their information and the pandemic exposes all weaknesses in organizations’ cybersecurity culture, if any exists. Another sin is believing a layered, complex solution equals a decent security plan. Complexity actually creates more problems, especially when plans involve too much overhead management and talking about “doing something” instead of taking action.
Credential abuse is also a deadly sin. One commits credential abuse in the over reliance of simple passwords. People love simple passwords, because they are easy to remember and they hate complex credential systems because they are annoying. It might be better to find an alternative solution:
“So what solutions should you start exploring? Identity & Access Management, Privileged Access Management (PAM), Just-In-Time/Just-Enough Administration, Role-based access controls, Multi-Factor Authentication, and more. What about Single Sign-On? Federated Identity management? everyone must adhere to secure credential management without exception…In climbing, free-soloing might be the epitome of cool, but when you fall, you’ll wish you had a belay.”
The article advises to be aware that you cannot treat all of your information the same way. The example the article uses is treating a mobile number differently than a credit card number. It is important to be aware of how any information posted online could be potentially harmful.
Then an ultimate sin is not paying attention to blind spots:
“Many threats “hide in plain sight” and we don’t have the time, energy, and resources to look for them, let alone know where to start.This problem is due to complexity, a lack of resources, and too many gaps and overlaps.”
The key to absolving this sin is discovering the blind spots, then developing solutions.
Sin, however, is part of the human condition. Bad actors sense opportunities and exploit them. Cyber crime continues to thrive and become more pervasive.
Whitney Grace, October 24, 2020
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