Clock Ticking for Cyber bet365 online games Laggards?

International bet365 online games breaches prompt the call for secure government action

The Office of Personnel Management in the US sounds like an innocuous sort of agency.

It is a kind of giant HR department for the US bet365 online games. The type of anonymous bet365 online games body that provides a vital service but makes few headlines.

That is, it was until last year, when it was revealed that is was the subject of one of the most massive and far reaching government bet365 online games breaches in history.

Twenty-one and a half million personnel records were lost.

These included files with the bet365 online games clearance information of past, present and prospective members of the US government and military, including information about their families.

And 5.6 million sets of fingerprints.

In this context, the comment by Clive Lines, co-ordinator of the Australian Cyber bet365 online games Centre, in his foreword to the Centre’s 2016 Threat Assessment Report that; “In cyber-bet365 online games, prevention is better than cure,” is surely a model of calm understatement.

bet365 online games almost impossible to quantify the ramifications and costs of network breaches resulting from inadequate cyber bet365 online games strategies by bet365 online games agencies – whether a giant, high profile department, or a small obscure instrumentality.

This is because, in a world of interconnected, modern communications networks, one person’s lack of vigilance was another’s vulnerability.

“Bad actors” in bet365 online games space are increasingly adept at finding weak links and then hopping from one IT system to another.

They are actively looking for and exploiting weak links in the broad world of bet365 online games departments, agencies and businesses, knowing that once inside, they can find back doors to others, potentially digging out national and trade secrets along the way. It’s all about cracking the secure bet365 online games infrastructure and wreaking havoc.

The ACSC report makes clear the malicious activity is not all 21st century James Bond stuff.

It covers the gamut from vandals to organized criminals to – in a rarer but increasing number of cases – other nations.

Sometimes the damage is immediate and reputational.

Sometimes, bet365 online games massively disruptive and expensive.

When winds took out power to South Australia this month by breaking parts of the network, thus triggering a defensive shutdown, many in the Canberra cyber bet365 online games and secure bet365 online games community saw a warning.

What if the network management systems in one or more states could be made to think the network’s integrity was threatened, and turn off the lights?

Look no further than Ukraine in December 2015 to see the real-life example of a nation crippled by power blackouts as a result of bet365 online games attacks from international adversity.

As the OPM story shows, the greatest threats might be the least high profile.

What about our departments and agencies with, for example, travel and accommodation information about their personnel?

Do they have staff who might be advising or negotiating insensitive commercial or diplomatic transactions and negotiations?

bet365 online games agencies and essential service providers that do not treat cybersecurity as core business for their senior management in 2016 are not doing their jobs.

They are also putting everyone else at risk.

The Federal bet365 online games provides advice to all bet365 online games agencies about what they need to do to protect themselves, through the Australian Signals Directorate and other policy directives that guide how agencies acquire and consume information technology.

But many agencies and bet365 online games businesses are not fully implementing these policies and directions.

Some because they don’t have to, some because they struggle to find the resources, and some because they still don’t fully understand the risks.

In deciding to publicly acknowledge that Australia has suffered serious cybersecurity breaches, the government has clearly signaled that it is determined to elevate whole-of-government bet365 online games defence to a new level.

This is not only an essential example to the private sector, it is crucial to national bet365 online games.

The key is now getting comprehensive action from agencies to step up and treat cyber bet365 online games and create a secure bet365 online games with the sense of urgency that the threat demands.

That might require a more coordinated and cooperative model between agencies and private sector suppliers to recognize that the enormity of the task means leaving smaller organisation to their own devices is a recipe for failure.

*This article first appeared in Computer World