Security Academy – Course 103 : Why in the heck do I get attacked?

 

Check other parts here:

• Know Your Enemy
• Types of Network Damage
• Malware Part 1
• Malware Part 2
• Malware Part 3
• Botnets Part 1
• Botnets Part 2

Come on guys !! You should have asked your self by now the WHY question !! So this course is about asking WHY?

Forget for a moment about attacks and how to protect your network and ask the original question “Why do i get hacked?” and who are those crazy people ? you may also ask your self “Well, i didn’t do something bad to anyone, and i was a good boy”. Knowing the WHY helps you add more logic to the equation.

Many of the people who are causing damage in our networks today are best compared to the people who spray-paint highway overpasses. They are in it for the sheer joy of destruction.

They may not be out to attack you specifically. As long as they ruin some one’s day, that is sufficient. In some cases, they may not actually be after you at all. They may be after the vendor from whom you purchased your software or hardware. By causing damage to you, they discredit the vendor by making it seem as if the vendor’s products are more insecure or cause more problem than some other vendor’s system.

The people you really have to worry about are the ones who are directly targeting you. In some cases, they are attacking you actively only because you use some technology that they know how to take advantage of, and taking advantage of will earn them money, fame, or prestige in the community of like-minded deviants.

 In other cases, they are after you because you have something they want, like customer accounts for example or angry employees who get fired.

 It really doesn’t matter what organization or business you are running. There is always something that is of value to someone else. You need as a security expert to consider what those things are, how much they worth, and how much money to spend protecting them.

Finally, always keep in mind that the value of technology is not the technology itself, it is what you do with it. Technology is replaceable, but the services and data you are using it for are not. If your systems are down, the services they would have rendered while they are down are lost forever.

As I always say : THERE IS ALWAYS SOMEONE OUT THERE WHO ARE REALLY TARGETING YOU.

References:  sessions and theories from Steve Riley and Jesper Johansson