Week 3 - CYBR 650

It's MONDAY! Wait a second!!!

Ok, so last week was a total bust!

Things I learned last week:

1. Jet skis are not as easy to fix as you think
2. Baskin Robbins ice cream cakes do not fare well in an ice chest
3. Even though you are playing in the water, you can suffer from heat exhaustion
4. Even though you are playing in the water, you can suffer from dehydration
5. You can get 2nd degree sunburn playing on the water with jet skis
6. Nurses don't like 2nd degree sunburns on the back of your hands (caused by holding on to the jet ski throttle) because there is no place to put the IV
7. Despite it all, it was one heck of a great time!!!!! 7 extremely happy and yet very exhausted (and wore more sunblock than me) children: PRICELESS!!! :-)

One of my assignments for this class had me read about an event or news article about something to do with Cybersecurity. Human nature has always fascinated me and those of you locals who know me, also know this.

This leads me to social engineering. In essence, fooling others to get what you want. We see this every day. Locally, a tax increase was passed based on written intentions, but we just recently found out otherwise. The City played it well. They used a survey company to call the residents (I was actually one of them) about what was important to me in regards to what the local government should provide. They issued a "fiscal emergency." They hired a consultant to print out informative brochures about the new tax measure. It passed.

The City is now discussing ending the "fiscal emergency," hiring a federal lobbyist, putting a certain amount of the new funds into parks and rec instead of police and streets, losing one police position, and all before impaneling the oversight committee.

What does this have to do with Cybersecurity? Think about it. How many times have we been duped?

You know those questions that people like you to answer on Facebook? The ones about your favorite vacation spot? Your favorite color? Where your wedding rehearsal dinner was held? Who your favorite author is?

Have you ever stopped to wonder where those questions came from? Probably not. You think, "Hey! I know these people! They are my friends and probably know those answers already!" and then you answer them. These questions that you are answering for the world to see are based off of biometric security questions that can access your personal accounts! DOH! Don't feel bad though because it has been discovered that even CISSPs have been known to fill out those "surveys" without realizing what they were!!!

Without social engineering, there would be no need for Cybersecurity. Hackers, criminals, terrorists, and even national enemies rely on social engineering to obtain their objectives.

Recently, I was discussing with a friend about how the Navy issues colors for its passes on vehicles. The colors indicate what department the driver works in for the Navy. It also states what region they do it in! During this discussion, she told me that the Navy was going to change that. I asked her, "Really? What color?" She responded, "I'm not going to tell you!" I guess I need to practice this a bit more.

There is an advantage to posting this a little bit late. "Coach" presented me some interesting links to my assignment I submitted:

Institute for Competitive Intelligence

Confidential: Business Secrets - Getting Theirs, Keeping Yours

Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard

Cybersecurity, while it seems to be centered around technology really isn't. Think about it. What are the motives of most our threats? Greed? Power? Maliciousness? Corporate Advantage?

Human nature has not changed and that includes its negative aspects. It is because of these negative aspects of human nature that the need for Cybersecurity was ever designed. As technology advanced, so did how people do things to get bad things done. Without human nature, there would never be a need for Cybersecurity, or computer forensics, or police, well, you get my drift.