How can organizations and governments defend themselves against these attacks? What are the best strategies?
The real concept and understanding of cybersecurity is still very recent and many still distrust its use. However, it has become indispensable due to the current technological growth and diffusion. With them came the need for all businesses to rely on cybersecurity to enter all the data relating to the performance of their main administrative and production functions. In turn, this large amount of data available has also increased the risk of cyber-attacks forcing companies to create protection plans from foreign and external sources.
Like technology, cyber-attacks have evolved over time, resulting in different recipients and consequences: no exceptions are made insofar as to the attackers, them being individuals, companies as well as governments. The aim of such outbreaks are mainly manipulation and stealth of data and may be at the core of governmental strategies to obtain crucial information from other agencies. Despite the efforts to tackle such issues, these episodes are more and more frequent nowadays and companies must now include protection policies to safeguard their materials.
In reality, there is still a lot of mistrust in cybersecurity tools requiring the acceptance of conditions that some perceive as an undermining of one’s privacy. Further, the cybersecurity institute lacks stability and reliability. At the national level for instance, it collides with the many limitations and obstacles due to legislative gaps, insufficient specialized skills as well as the knowledge applied to the creation of this software. As a result, malware attacks have increased dramatically: over 88% of companies have experienced some type of electronic threat or fraud while only 5% of company folders are properly protected.
Therefore, several risks have emerged which have led organizations around the world to adopt common strategies to solve the problem. OCCAM is well aware of the threats cyber-attacks create and has been working to collect useful policies to tackle them. During the 21st Edition of the Infopoverty World Conference, held on December 3 2021, Prof. Rosanna Di Gioia and Dr. Muhammad Khurram Khan debated on the feasible solutions as well as the urgency to address and concretely implement them.
“The problem with any digital economy is that it is too fragile, as far as cybersecurity is concerned, and a serious set of cyber-attack scould cripple down the whole economy. […] Activists are politically, socially or ideologically motivated, and they usually target victims to achieve a regime change or public opinion influence. There is a need to build a global strategic framework and ecosystem for Cybersecurity Awareness and cyber hygiene practices to protect the masses from cyber criminals and online risk”.
(Muhammad Khurram Khan, XXI Infopoverty World Conference)
Confronting with the vast nature of cyber-attacks requires inter-and-intra-governmental regulations at national, international and supranational levels as well as continuous spreading of awareness.