Security – A never ending Story

The more our societies rely on computerized information sharing the more we need to take care that we implement protection mechanisms to run the systems reliable. There are many discussions and approaches how to make or keep the systems robust.

These days there are several discussions going on about whether it is better to keep the vulnerabilities top secret or to let people know how close we are to a lot of critical damages.

Whatever your position is: There is a need to increase the efforts to keep control over our critical infrastructures. And this will require a lot more resources than those written in many business plans for 2014, 2015 and beyond. We have to pay for it anyway: NOW or LATER! Maybe it will be more expensive to pay later!

It is not sufficient to know the issues – We must prevent or fix them actively … as soon as possible.

The other day a new study on ICS and SCADA Security was published:

Critical Infrastructure: Security Preparedness and Maturity

Sponsored by Unisys Independently conducted by Ponemon Institute LLC

“The purpose of this research is to learn how utility, oil and gas, alternate energy and manufacturing organizations are addressing cyber security threats. These industries have become a high profile target for security exploits. Moreover, it has been reported that if their industrial controls systems (ICS) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems were attacked the damage could be enormous. …
As the findings reveal, organizations are not as prepared as they should be to deal with the sophistication and frequency of a cyber threat or the negligence of an employee or third party. In fact, the majority of participants in this study do not believe their companies’ IT security programs are “mature.””

Click HERE to download the report.

My personal understanding is: Everything that is remotely accessible can be breached; everything that is programmed can be re-programmed.

Isn’t it true what King Salmon wrote in Ecclesiastes 1,18 (King James Version): “For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.”

This is our daily experience! Or?