State Of Cyber Security

Introduction

            The use of the internet has brought about tremendous transformation in the way organizations and institutions are undertaking their roles. Today, organizations are more data driven and customer oriented often relying on the internet platform and linking them to their various systems. Unfortunately, using the internet has also brought about its equal measure of threats with organization being cyber bullied by hackers and other individuals who bulldoze into their system holding them at ransom. At times, these individuals may target customer data since almost all organization are relying on the internet to transfer information which is sensitive and which may offer lucrative opportunity for them to steal trade secrets, money or even sensitive information which could have disastrous impact were it released to the general public. This outline will review the current level of awareness in regards to cyber threats, the type of threats and their actors, the areas where they attack, the current statistics regarding these attacks, and the current level of awareness regarding cyber attacks

Analyzing Present Statistics

Type of threats and actors

            Cyber threats often emanates from a variety of actors. According to a report by ISACA and RSA Conference Survey (2015) conducted in 2014, the number of attacks range from cybercriminals, the states, hacktivists, hackers, malicious insiders and non-malicious insiders. The percentages tagged on each are 45.6%, 17.45%, 19.81%, 40.09%, 28.62% and 40.72% respectively. In the same context, lie the different types of threats, which are exploited. These are categorized into hacking attempt, malware, social engineering, phishing, waterhole, main in the middle attacks, SQL injections, insider theft and lost mobile devices. The rating scale in these are  50.14%, 66.48%, 46.45%, 68.32%, 7.53%, 11.08%, 21.88% and 43.89% respectively. In the same research ISACA and RSA Conference Survey (2015) reviews how organizations in the modern world are coping to such threats to minimize the chances of occurring by creating organizations. Their study reveals most organizations do not offer attention to their cyber platforms, as they have not created awareness to minimize these problems internally, which are the major areas of vulnerability.

Areas that are commonly attacked

            In each of these threats, there are motivations underlying the actions of the actors. In the research by ISACA and RSA Conference Survey (2015)  motivation ranges from classified data which falls at 11.61%, theft of personally identifiable information 11.74%, intellectual property theft 19.43%, disruption of service 24.43% and financial