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Intro: Security is the top most concern for the enterprises and 2013 was considered to be an exhausting year for cyber defenders. However, with new security visibility tools available to curb the breach of data, 2014 would be the year of security visibility. Bhawna Satsangi lists few trends that will dominate security industry.
Breach of data, increasing cyber criminal activities, need for security concerns are the major issues that hover in 2013. Security agencies like McAfee, Watchguard, Kaspersky etc. emphasised lot on security threats and are geared up for next generation security trends in 2014.
New technology a challenge
With new technologies coming in, the threat for security breach is cause of concern. To look into the demands of companies to give them one single solution to address the overall technology challenges is not practically feasible. The new emerging technology of BYOD needs to be looked at from different dimensions like Data Loss Prevention, Network access Control, Authentication system, internal intrusion prevention systems, internal firewalls, securing Wi-Fi etc. This demands that companies relook at the security architecture and rebuild it to fit BYOD needs.
Privacy
Theft or loss of your private data/information is another concern for the professional. Protecting the information stored on computers and devices and ensuring online behavior remains confidential. This will lead to greater popularity for VPN services and Tor-anonymizers as well as increased demand for local encryption tools.
Increased Cyber Kidnappings Raise Attacker Profits
Ransomware, a class of malicious software that tries to take a computer hostage, has grown steadily over the past few years, but a particularly nasty variant emerged in 2013: CryptoLocker. This year, it has affected millions and it is suspected that the authors have made a high return in their criminal investment. In 2014, many other cyber criminals will try to copy CryptoLocker’s success by mimicking its techniques and capabilities. Plan for a surge of ransomware in 2014.
Advance versions of Trojan to curb money theft
Cybercriminals will continue develop tools to steal cash – directly or indirectly. To plunder pockets directly, the fraudsters will further refine their tools designed to access the bank accounts of mobile device owners (mobile phishing, banking Trojans). Mobile botnets will be bought and sold and will also be used to distribute malicious attachments on behalf of third parties. To support indirect thefts, it is likely that we will see more sophisticated versions of the Trojans which encrypt the data on mobile devices, preventing access to photos, contacts and correspondence until a decryption fee is handed over. Android-based smartphones will no doubt be the first to be targeted.
Real-Time visibility of threat trends
The volume of threats and the nature of hidden, stealthy malware that is designed to evade traditional protection counter measures will require every organization to have instant visibility across devices. Of critical importance will be the ability to query for data and make decisions on how to protect the network, and then make relevant changes in real time.
Break the Internet of Things (IoT)
Next year will witness white and black hat hackers to spend more time cracking non-traditional computer devices such as cars, watches, toys and medical devices. While security experts have warned about securing these devices for the past few years, the market is just now catching up with the expectation. WatchGuard suspects that good and bad hackers will focus heavily on finding holes in these IoT devices in 2014. The Internet of Things is permeating the marketplace, bringing physical objects together through remote accessibility across the Internet without the need for human intervention, using the same wireless networks and Internet Protocol (IP) that connects your computer to the Internet. According to Ericsson, there will be 50 billion IP-connected devices by 2020, up from 1 billion just a year ago. This phenomenon has exploded the threat scope for these devices with ATMs, point-of-sale (POS) terminals, kiosks, medical equipment, SCADA systems and other embedded devices being hacked in ever-increasing numbers. To work as intended, most of these devices include embedded sensors that make it very easy to track the movements of those devices and monitor interactions with them.
Cloud storage providers
Hackers are targeting cloud service employees, seeing them as the weakest link in the security chain. A successful attack here could hand cybercriminals the keys to huge volumes of data. In addition to data theft attackers may be interested in deleting or modifying information – in some cases manipulated misinformation could be worth even more to those who commission the attacks. This is an on-going trend.
Securing Data centers
With the blurring of boundaries between physical, virtual and public/private clouds, organizations are on an evolutionary curve towards next-generation data centres. Resultantly they will face the reality of securing data that moves between server, storage, and networking resources (physical and virtual) of next-generation data centres.
Chain-of-Trust Hack
While top-level victims, like government and Fortune 500 businesses may have a higher security pedigree, they can still fail to stop the persistent, advanced hacker who preys on the weakest links on organizations’ chains of trust – partners and contractors. As advanced attackers go after harder targets, expect to see more “chain-of-trust” cyber breaches in 2014, where hackers hijack partners in order to gain access to high level organizations.
For software developers
The theft of popular product sources (gaming industry, mobile apps developers, etc) gives attackers an excellent opportunity to find vulnerabilities in the products and then to use them for their own fraudulent purposes. In addition, if cybercriminals have access to the victim’s repositories, they can modify the program source code and embed backdoors into it.
Security amongst SMBs
Indian SMBs largely represent knowledge based businesses such as chartered accountants, law firms etc. They are likely to have money moving around through (wire transfers, vendor payments, and customer payments) and their knowledge intensive nature, makes them potentially vulnerable to cyber threats. Many smaller businesses often lack budget and expertise, and typically have liberal, rarely enforced policies for use of personal devices, in-office Wi-Fi access, installation of unauthorized apps, thereby exposing itself to huge threats. Next year, we will see SMBs get more mainstream in their adoption of comprehensive security.
In the ensuing year, there will be greater consciousness for security to be approached from a combination of endpoint, network, and data-centric controls for discovery, prevention, detection, response, and audit rather than each of these elements in a siloed manner. This interlocked approach, ensures better intelligence exchange arming companies with situational awareness and real time for quick and strategic action.
