Page 3 - index
P. 3
Brave New World of Global Eavesdropping and Zero-day Malware
While we all look to the future with RSA Conference 2014 just
around the corner next February, we still have lots to do. It seems
major world powers from the USA’s NSA to the Russian KGB to
China’s dedicated Cyber-Red Army, all want to spy on all of us, all
the time. For what purpose? Leverage? Control? Power? Yes,
to all of the above. This brave new world order of global
eavesdropping seems to stem from a paranoid approach and lack
of trust not only of competing Nation states but of their mutual
citizens. In addition, these new forms of Eavesdropping, ranging from spying on Google emails
and search results to leveraging products and services like Facebook among others has only
taxed and damaged the Internet as well as the trust in its usage. The idealogy that you can find
a needle in a trillion byte haystack seems ludicrous – yet unchecked – government entities have
decided to create systems to allow them to eavesdrop on everything possible.
Now, instead of empowering others to move to the cloud or to leverage so much mobile
horsepower, we now have to worry about our geolocation, our conversations lack of privacy –
ultimately a complete lack of respect by world governments. When Putin starts talking about the
US eavesdropping program being unbelievable and whistleblowers like Snowden run for safety
into the arms of Mother Russia, one has to ask, has the world been turned completely upside
down? We keep finding Advanced Persistent Threats and Zero-day Malware being developed
solely for the purpose of eavesdropping – this is unheard of – where past malware was almost
always made by cyber criminals for the purposes of identity theft, costing banks Billions of
dollars in losses accrued, with in-country citizens suffering from these breaches and needing
new bank accounts, debit and credit cards. This new malware is truly a new wave of “Spyware”.
With that all said, now is the time to learn about the best practices, tools and techniques to
protect your own privacy and that of your organization. Vigilance is ever so critical.
Pierluigi Paganini
Pierluigi Paganini, Editor-in-Chief, [email protected]
P.S. Congrats Robert Waterman (USA) – this month’s contest winner!
