Cyber-Attacks: More Public Awareness and More US Gov. Direction Needed
CNBC's Eamon Javers interviews Mike Brown, a retired Rear Admiral in the U.S. Navy, and the current General Manager of RSA's Federal Business. Brown explains that the sequester will hurt U.S. cyber security and affect the private sector. He also believes that greater awareness of cyber-attacks is needed.
Far too often, businesses fail to take basic steps to protect their digital infrastructure. In fact, the majority of data breaches derive from disgruntled employees with access to critical data. Far too often, they steal their own company's data and sell this information for lucrative amounts to professional cyber-thieves.
Simple steps, including protecting who has access to mainframes and company servers, can help protect and reduce the amount of cyberattacks.
(Read More: Why Companies Keep Quiet About Cyberattacks)
In the same research by Veracode, 61 percent of small businesses do not have antivirus protection on all of their in-house computers and 77 percent do not have an in-house Internet security policy.
Clearly, we notice a lack of basic security and employee training in the workplace that would help employees identify certain email messages that lure employees in to data breech opportunities. For example, we often see the email that is sent to our employees inviting them to register for a new product that includes a harmful link in the message.
Training programs that aim to keep our employees up-to-date with trends in dangerous messages can help prevent some of the attacks. Other in-house considerations, including maintaining sophisticated anti-virus and spamware applications, need to be addressed as well.
The concern, however, is finding the parallel between meeting the rising demand to protect a businesses' digital infrastructure and the costs associated with protecting it.
While the president has acknowledged that "information warfare" is a serious danger, the voluntary adoption plan still lacks clarity in how small businesses will be incentivized to participate in the executive order. Over the next few months, there must be additional details for how our 23 million small businesses can participate in the new "cybersecurity framework," including an emphasis on incentives for the plan.
Businesses continue the ongoing battle with rising operational and labor costs, and must start devoting resources to protecting their cybersecurity. The president is taking the right course by attacking this head-on, however, he needs to clarify the framework and consider offering incentives to participating firms.
(Read More: 10 Ways Companies Get Hacked)
Kenneth Wisnefski is a serial web entrepreneur and founder/CEO of WebiMax, a digital marketing firm based in Mt. Laurel, N.J. Mr. Wisnefski is an expert source in entrepreneurship, small business, online marketing and online security.
Source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/100512399
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