My Take on Hacking, Cyber Security and Ransomware.

Hacking, Cyber Security and Ransomware were once considered the realm of Hollywood, with films like Sneakers, iRobot, Hackers and The Matrix, making it look like fantasy, delivering a message of “it will never happen to me”.

Now, fiction is reality. It’s almost a case of not if, but when, mine, yours, your customers or fellow dealer’s information, will be compromised.

Your information, my information, your families and friend’s information, can potentially be ‘mined’ from your PC, laptop and smart phone, by a pimple faced school kid, with a high level of computing intelligence and an anarchists mind.

I spoke at a conference in late April, highlighting the importance of Antivirus, email protection and being careful with passwords.

I urged all in the room to adopt an adage of;

If it looks like, smells like, feels like, sounds like, it probably is a virus or some form of attempted Cyber Crime.

Whilst Australia and New Zealand may have missed the worst of the most recent worldwide cyber-attack known as WCry (WannaCry), it only takes a few minutes of scrolling the news.com.au website (http://www.news.com.au/technology/online/hacking) to see that this is a global problem and why some pundits are calling this the greatest threat to business and personal information,  in our life time!

Unfortunately many weren’t so lucky! In the UK for example; the National Health Service (responsible for the Public Health System in the UK)  has been forced to cancel operations within its hospitals,  after computers used to share patients’ test results and scans with doctors,  were frozen and held to ‘Ransom’.

Ransomware, Cyber Crime, whatever you want to call it, in my opinion will affect everyone into the future. The Australian Government has now even started to try and legislate against the activities, by holding business to account for their levels of safe-guarding personal information and cybercrime prevention.

The changes to the Privacy Amendment (Notifiable Data Breaches) Act 2017 start this process. The Act notes;

•       Organisations from Feb ‘18 are legally obliged to disclose data breaches to the Federal Government.

I further noted that this potentially affects businesses with a turnover of $3M (some less!).  Failure to report can incur fines of up to $340,000 for individuals/ $1,700,000 for businesses. 

Whilst the Act and penalties are clear what, in my opinion is not are the ‘grey’ areas such as;

·      How do I report?

·     When should reporting take place?

·      What constitutes a data breach?

·      What is the trigger to realise the severity of the breach?

·      Do I notify customers?

·      How do I notify customers?

·      What data is personal and what is freely available in the public domain? 

Questions we all should be urgently trying to find answer too, and questions the Government needs to answer!

Organisations are finally starting to take these threats and legalities associated very seriously. Moving to Microsoft Enterprise technologies, with leading corporate partners for our Antivirus, Scanning and Firewall protection, is one way to help combat the ‘epidemic’.

However, it would be prudent of you all to discuss your situation with your IT personnel, insuring that your protected and that you know where you stand in relation to the Privacy Amendment (Notifiable Data Breaches) Act

But what can you do right now to help and make sure your safe?

The recently released Window 10, periodically checks for updates and automatically downloads and installs them unless told otherwise.

But if you’re not sure if your computer’s software is up to date, you can very easily check with the steps below.

·      Select the Window icon at the bottom left of the screen known as the Start button.

·      In the search box, type “Update” and then in the list of results, click “Windows Update”.

·       Click “Check for updates” and your computer will run a test to find any updates.

·      If it says your device is up to date, you have the latest software available and you should be able to breathe a little easier.

Personally, I wouldn’t stop there, you should regularly check to make sure that all software, not just Windows and Antivirus software, is up to date.  Not just when there is a known threat.

It’s surprising to note 20% of IT users buy a new PC with free Antivirus Software for a year and then never renew or move to another provider! - Dr Lior Raucheberger – Hot Breakfast Interview Triple M  FM Melbourne 15/05/2017

In a recent article on the Microsoft Website, they stressed the importance of keeping all software updated, noting:

“As cybercriminals become more sophisticated, there is simply no way for customers to protect themselves against threats unless they update their systems. The eternal problem is that for individuals, there is often the attitude of “well it works fine, why I should change it?”

This is enormously dangerous.

Older software has ‘holes’. Holes in which Hackers learn to exploit quickly.

“Organisations are notoriously bad at keeping software modern, especially those in the public and small business sectors.”

Unfortunately the difficulty is there are literally hundreds of instances of Ransomware appearing in Australia each week! Keeping up to date and apprised of this is the realm of experts.

 As such,  I urge you to please ensure you are talking to the right people, that they are making sure your businesses are protected and in turn,  you are doing your ‘bit’ to protect my information!