Just like clockwork, another weekend is over and Monday is here again. To lighten the load, El Reg is offering you the latest instalment of Who, Me?, our weekly sysadmin confessional column. This time we meet “Romeo”, who was working at a large music company in London at the time in question. It was his first job for a big multinational and the firm had just been hit by the I Love You virus that crippled systems all over Europe back in 2000.
The threat landscape is radically different in a connected, digital world. Critical infrastructures, from smart metres to payment systems, are no longer constrained by geography. Personal digital assets, such as identity and online behaviour data, are increasingly globalised. Threats to these aren’t nearly as easy to monitor or defend against – and governments’ ability to deal with them is being eroded. Industries and businesses are now finding themselves on the front line, safeguarding the digital economy against a series of emerging systemic risks – most notably cyber.
Are Companies turning to Recruiters to help them with the Talent Shortage in Cyber Security? There has been huge growth in the search for recruitment agencies specialising in Cyber security. A study conducted by technology recruitment company, Finlay James has identified a 93% increase year on year in people searching for cyber security recruitment and related terms in Google. The news comes after the ISC anticipated a worldwide shortage of 1.8 million cyber security professionals by 2022 but the lack of skills to tackle cybercrime is already causing problems.
The alarming rate of crypto-jacking attacks ravaging the internet has been a cause of worry as the trend keeps gaining momentum. Two months ago, over 170,000 computers were surreptitiously used in manufacturing malware scripts in Brazil, with another report indicating a similar trend in Moldova where 25,000 MikroTik routers were used in running CoinHive scripts. Trustwave researcher, Troy Mursch has attempted to draw a parallel between these two attacks but it is unknown whether they were actually connected. The latest attack was witnessed in India, where almost 30,000 MikroTik routers have been infected with CoinHive according to report released via Banbreach’s twitter handle.
A Westpac manager handed over the banking passwords of 80 customer accounts to a mortgage broker, giving them direct access to personal bank accounts in a serious breach of customer privacy. It is one of a catalogue of 32 breaches Australia’s four largest banks disclosed to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) between January 2012 and April 2018 that were obtained by 7.30 under Freedom of Information laws.
