However, what I find even more interesting than this treasure trove of curated information is when cybersecurity news makes its way into mainstream media, and shows up in what I and perhaps others would believe is an unlikely place. Case in point is a recent article I read published in, of all places, Popular Mechanics.
The article, by journalist Tim Newcomb, that recently popped up on my general Apple News feed is titled “A Catastrophic Mutating Event Will Strike the World in 2 Years, Report Says”. Wow! Talk about an eye catching headline, found on a website that also discusses the best drill bits and electric toothbrushes. This is definitely not the headline I would expect from Popular Mechanics, however it definitely seems to tie in very nicely with my previous blog posting “When It Rains It Floods”, which spoke to how rapidly cyber attacks are growing.
The article, which, by the way, is rather well written, essentially references a portion of the presentation recently unveiled at the 2023 World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, in which WEF managing director Jeremy Jurgens highlights the 2023 Global Security Outlook, and he does not pull any punches. In the presentation he states that “93 percent of cyber leaders, and 86 percent of cyber business leaders, believe that the geopolitical instability makes a catastrophic cyber event likely in the next two years. This far exceeds anything that we’ve see in previous surveys.”
The article gets more interesting as one reads on, and the part of the article that literally blew me away was where Edi Rama, Albania’s prime minister, states that “the growth of the cybercrime industry—from $3 trillion in 2015 to an expected $10.5 trillion in 2025, Rama says during the presentation—means that if cybercrime was a state, it would be the third largest global economy after the U.S. and China.”
Ummm…HOLY CRAP!
Now we all know cybersecurity issues are a growing problem. In fact it is a massive growing problem, but even I, who lives and breathes cybersecurity, had no idea it was this big, and nothing seems to be slowing it down. Cybercrime has become very organized over the last decade (or longer). As we all know, it is not just people having fun “owning” someone’s system. Cybercriminals not only go after big targets, but they also now do enough covert research on enterprise systems so they can determine precisely what the payout will be. It has gotten to the point where it makes sense for an investor with a criminal mindset (e.g. a cartel) to speculate and be almost guaranteed a substantial return on investment.
The article goes on to reference the global response to COVID 19, but points out that a major global equivalent of a digital pandemic (a phrase I like to use) would have a far more catastrophic outcome.
It remains unclear to me, and perhaps many cybersecurity professionals, exactly what it is going to take to persuade organizations to get more serious about addressing cybersecurity, but one thing is certain, if something does not change substantially very soon, we will be reading about the errors of our ways in every major and minor publication in the world…unless, or course, cyberattackers manage to shut those down as well.