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The Root of Cyber Breaches ERIC ROBUCK, CISSP, CEH, SEC+, AWS THE VALANDER GROUP The Cybersecurity world is a mess. According to Security magazine, there were 1,767 publicly reported data breaches exposing 18.8 billion records in 2021. This is a decrease from 2020’s pace. Although this may seem like progress, let me assure you it is certainly not. Data breaches have decreased because a more profitable attack has taken its place; Ransomware. However, ransomware and data breaches are the symptoms, not the disease. When we as a cybersecurity community get a handle on ransomware attacks, there will be another type of attack to take its place. The issue is not that there are attacks; the issue is the culture in our organizations. The only way to start gaining ground in the cyberwar is to instill a culture of security at every level. The only way this culture can be created is through command emphasis from the top of our organizations. A fundamental culture change must happen in leadership to drive that change. Leaders must understand the challenges they are facing to keep the data and the students they are entrusted with safe. In this article, I 50
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will discuss three topics every leader must understand to effectively lead security strategies and create a culture of security. The first issue leaders must recognize is who is attacking them. There is a quote from a book written two thousand years ago that is relevant to this discussion. In The Art of War, Sun Tzu wrote, "If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle." This quote is extremely insightful. In the cyber battle, when one type of attack is controlled, another is on the way. The issue is that we, as leaders underestimate our adversary. When we close our eyes and imagine who the hackers are, we envision a person in their parent's basement, overweight, dirty, and socially awkward, pounding on their keyboards at three am. This is not the case. There are entire companies MyNetworkMag.com
