The number one group driving security attacks is made up of sophisticated professionals, criminal networks, and perhaps even organised elements attached to nation states.
These are the words of Francis deSouza, senior VP, Enterprise Security Group at Symantec, discussing security trends during a media briefing at the company's Vision 2010 event in Barcelona, this week. “A trend we are seeing at the moment is the shift in the groups carrying out attacks today.”
He said the second threat group consists of well meaning insiders. “The employee that leaves a USB stick with unencrypted information in the back of a cab, or a laptop at an airport.”
The third group, said deSouza, is made up of malicious insiders, those that have legitimate access and are deliberately stealing information. “There has been a rise in the number of disgruntled employees as well as those employees wishing to make a quick profit on the side.”
Interestingly enough, he said 48% of all breaches in 2009 were due to insider involvement.
“Hackers are no longer a top concern,” he explained. “Less than 10% of attacks these days are carried out by 'basement' hackers, making this group fourth in the threat category.”
Another trend, he said, is around the growing complexity of the infrastructure organisations are required to protect. “Adding to this is the information explosion we have seen over the past years, and will continue to see in the future.”
He said that the growing trend of cloud computing compounds the problem. “It is estimated that corporations will spend about $6.4 billion on cloud in 2014. More and more data is living in public clouds that companies don't control themselves.
“In addition, IT departments need to worry about what devices are bringing into their environments. As business and personal lives merge, external devices such as laptops, PDAs and smartphones are hooking up to the network, bringing a whole host of new security concerns.”
According to deSouza, another trend Symantec is seeing is the growth in 'custom' malware. This has become a major concern for businesses, as many IT professionals don't have a lot of experience in sophisticated, targeted attacks.
Most security products and networks are designed to deal with known and more easily identifiable threats. Custom malware evades many security solutions, as it will not have a signature in the database.
Hand in hand with this, is the rising cost of data breaches. “75% of enterprises experienced some form of cyber attack last year. 97% of breaches used customised malware. In the UK, it is estimated that data breaches cost £59 per record - the hard cost associated with notifying someone of a data breach.”
He said the value of digital information stolen last year equated to $1 trillion. “Bear in mind, these days, one in 400 e-mails contains encrypted, confidential data.”
Symantec said it has the largest global intelligence network in the world, with 'feelers' in 200 countries. “We deal with around two billion security events daily,” explained deSouza.
“Today, we have to be much more responsive and in real-time. Threats today require real innovation, we are dealing with zero-day attacks; security shouldn't be taken lightly.”
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