Active defense: Going on the offensive against cyber criminals
With the UK government reporting that nearly 40 percent of UK businesses were hit by cyber attacks last year, keeping on top of cyber security has become a mission critical need.
Of those UK businesses and charities that were impacted, 83 percent identified phishing as being the most common attack vector. The government is urging these organizations to strengthen against phishing attacks such as business email compromise as they continue to grow in volume and frequency.
How to pay off your technical debt -- and why you should
Financial management is crucial as personal and business expenditures grow. Understanding where efficiency can be boosted and where costs can be cut is vital for a positive business cash flow. Something which may be overlooked is your technical debt.
Here we explore how to know whether you are facing technical debt, how it might be harming your business, and how to get out of it.
The perfect defense: How to stop cyber criminals from scoring
Data is more plentiful, valuable and interconnected than ever before. Unfortunately, this has led to a cyber threat landscape that is increasingly dynamic and costly to business.
Cybercrime inflicted approximately $6 trillion in damages globally in 2021, an annual figure that is set to reach $10.5 trillion by 2025. This is equivalent to the world’s third-largest GDP after the U.S. and China. It is a threat that requires a comprehensive approach to defending, protecting, and recovering data, avoiding vulnerabilities and maintaining business continuity.
Increasing complexity in healthcare leads to increased risk
The healthcare sector not only faces a greater number of threats from cyber-attacks compared to other industries but it could also be one of the most vulnerable industries to cyber attacks. These cybersecurity vulnerabilities were most highlighted by the recent attack on the UK's NHS this August, which resulted in widespread outages across the NHS.
Today, the healthcare industry continues to increasingly digitalise to ensure its resilience while improving the quality of care. This transformation has most recently, and rapidly, been driven by the Covid-19 pandemic which called on the industry to add new dimensions to the way that care is delivered to patients as well as increase the efficiency of overwhelmed healthcare systems. This resulted in the addition of new and innovative processes and applications such as telemedicine and the adoption of AI capabilities such as chatbots and real-time data analytics like medical imaging. However, with new technological additions, also new vulnerabilities and cyber risks are introduced into the healthcare systems.
Zero-trust architecture: A cybersecurity must-have
The COVID-19 pandemic ushered in a new era of remote and hybrid work that many of us knew was possible, but felt was years away from being realized. Now, we can work anywhere in the world asynchronously, with access to the documents and tech stack required to do our jobs as we would in an office setting.
While this has helped create a better work/life balance for many employees, this corporate culture shift has created a host of new challenges for cybersecurity teams. The increase in endpoints, with an increasing number of devices accessed remotely, requires a higher level of security to tackle growing online threats. How can IT teams champion hybrid workflows in an untrustworthy digital landscape? Fortunately, there is a solution to this problem -- a zero-trust architecture.
Small business versus enterprise -- what are the challenges around security?
Companies spend a lot on IT security, and that trend does not look like it’s stopping, despite the current economic headwinds. Gartner estimates that spending on information security and risk management will grow by 11.3 percent to reach more than $188.3 billion in 2023. Yet, in the face of mounting economic pressure, many companies are afraid they will have to cut their spending. According to our own research, around 44 percent of small and mid-sized enterprise (SME) companies think they will have to reduce their IT budgets in 2023.
Of these, around three quarters think this reduction will lead to increased risk to the business. When this happens stress and overtime increase dramatically -- already, we found that all IT professionals work more hours than they are paid for with 26 percent saying they average ten hours a week in overtime. In order to solve these problems, we have to think again about the role of IT security, and why the size of the company you support affects how you can achieve your goals.
Phishing for likes: How cybercriminals are exploiting Instagram's copyright reports
For anyone invested in social media, copyright infringement is a big deal. Users must be able to protect their intellectual property from imposters and opportunists trying to ride their coattails. As such, most platforms invite content owners to report infringement, but this useful function has joined the long list of communication channels cybercriminals exploit.
Trustwave researchers have found criminal gangs are impersonating Instagram’s copyright report emails in phishing campaigns, angling to trick users into sharing their details.
Forget the moral panic, gaming and impact games can stimulate mental wellbeing
No matter how much you enjoy gaming, chances are you’ve felt a nagging sense of guilt about playing at one point or another. Maybe it’s the result of having your parents tell you to get outside and play when you were growing up. Or maybe it’s just a societally-induced sense that spending a couple of hours immersed in a virtual world every day might not be the best thing for your mental health.
While there are always risks involved in allowing any hobby to become an obsession, we now know that much of the moral panic around gaming has been overwrought. In fact, a growing body of research shows that gaming can actually be very positive for mental health. It’s also becoming increasingly clear that those effects can also be magnified through the potential of impact games.
Detection and protection from crypto romance scams
You likely know what risks you face if you invest in cryptocurrency. The crypto market is highly volatile, and its decentralized status means no central authority backs the value of digital currencies. Another threat to investors is crypto romance scams.
Anyone who owns any form of cryptocurrency is a potential target for crypto romance scams. Here’s how to detect them and strategies to protect your finances from malicious cybercriminals.
Demand for automation is surging -- here's how to get projects right
The pandemic accelerated the digital transformation efforts that had already been a top priority for businesses industry wide. In early 2020, many organizations were thrust abruptly into survival mode, forced to rapidly support remote work and find new ways to ensure the success of both employees and customers.
Now, we are in a challenging economic climate where technology innovation has once again become critical to help organizations drive continued efficiency and growth right now. Automation increasingly sits front-and-center in these efforts, helping to drive down costs, enhance productivity, and add value across the business. But to work effectively, automation solutions must be deployed as components in the strategic technology landscape, not as quick fix, throwaway tools.
Becoming a data-informed organization
We hear a lot of talk these days about the virtues of data-driven organizations. That’s certainly reasonable up to a point -- but what does it really mean? When it comes to routine operational decisions, in particular, the current bias seems to favor increased automation over human judgment. The data doesn’t lie -- or so the story goes -- so we’re better off deferring to programmatic decision models.
That may be reasonable for some situations, but when you’re operating in a complex and nuanced domain, take casualty insurance claims for example, that highly automated decision paradigm can begin to fall apart very quickly. Thousands of different variables come into play. Medical records and accident reports contain subtle details that provide vital clues about potential risks. To complicate matters further, important minutiae are often buried deep inside the narrative content.
3 predictions that will shape the open source landscape in 2023
Digital transformation remains a highly important topic for enterprises that keeps evolving. With ongoing economic uncertainties, like rising inflation, market turbulence, and the energy and cost of living crisis, businesses are realizing they must do more with less over the coming year.
Organizations are gearing towards technologies that can enable their systems and processes to support each other seamlessly and enable them to drive efficiencies. In particular, they are turning to open source technologies to improve connectivity, observability and security in their ever-growing tech stacks.
Next wave of digital transformation: What should you know?
We’re all witnessing how the second wave of digital transformation (DT) or the so-called "digital transformation v2.0" is gaining steam. How does it differ from the primary version and what should you expect from it? How can it impact your digital strategy and what top priorities should you focus on?
91 percent of organizations have already implemented at least some digital initiatives, while the global spending on DT has passed a 1.5 trillion threshold and is predicted to reach 2.8 trillion by 2025. Sooner or later, every business that wants to survive the competition will face this next wave of digital transformation inevitably. What is it like and how to prepare for it to get transformed painlessly? Let’s get your ducks in a row so that you’re ready for the next step in your DT journey.
Insecure and inaccessible code can hinder investment in connected vehicles and limit innovation
Automakers are embracing artificial intelligence (AI) in a bid to create more personalized user experiences in connected vehicles. In March 2022, Google’s Waymo revealed driverless ride-hailing services were soon to be offered in cities such as San Francisco -- highlighting how the use of AI technology has increased as a result of companies like Google, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, and others entering the automobile market.
It's clear that manufacturers are seeking to deliver the best possible user experience (UX), but vehicle safety and regulation needs to be carefully examined. And as this technology is more widely adopted, software developers will eventually be seen as the new mechanics.
Is coding as hard as it seems?
We have Hollywood movies to thank for the public's somewhat warped perception of coding. We're all too familiar with the bespectacled-super-genius-furiously-typing-as-sleek-but-meaningless-graphics-rotate-on-a-screen trope.
In reality, using code is less of a HIIT workout for the fingers and more scouring Stack Overflow to figure out why your program isn't working. Coding gets a bit of a bad rap -- it's often considered complicated to understand and even harder to get into. But while there are certainly challenges to coding and software development, it can also be a highly rewarding skill to learn.
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