Security laws have not made businesses safe, say hackers
- Reduce text size Decrease text size
- Increase text size Increase text size
- Print article Print
- Jump to comments Comment
- Share this article Share
- Email article to a friend Email
Government regulation has had no affect on hackers’ ability to access corporate networks, according to hacker conference poll
Government attempts to improve information security through regulation have had no impact on the ability of hackers to break into corporate networks, according to 70% of self-identified hackers polled at the Defcon conference in Las Vegas earlier this month.
Furthermore, 15% of respondents said they believed that “regulations introduced by governments worldwide to implement privacy, security and process controls” had made hacking easier.
"While standards such as PCI-DSS provide a good baseline [for example], organisations that assume achieving PCI compliance will solve their security woes are in for a rude awakening," said Michael Hamelin, chief security architect at Tufin Technologies, the company that conducted a poll. This month's Information Age cover feaure on the risk management approach to IT security found this view to be increasingly common.
The poll of 79 delegates at the hackers convention found that 96% believe all security investments are worthless unless the firewall is properly configured and monitored.
It also threw some light onto the ‘working’ habits of hackers. For example, the most popular time to hack is weekday evenings, with only 15% of respondents preferring the weekends.
IT security managers currently on their summer holidays can relax in peace; 89% of respondents said that the summer holidays would have little impact on their hacking activity. The winter holidays are a different matter, however: 56% of respondents said that Christmas is the best time for corporate hacking.
Join us at Enterprise Security & Continuity 2009!
The credit squeeze has inspired a new wave of security and continuity service offerings that take capital cost out of the IT equation. The drive towards cloud computing, with organisations investigating both internal and external clouds, represents as many challenges for security and continuity services as business opportunities.
Information Age’s Enterprise Security & Continuity 2009 conference, part of our Autumn Forum which takes place on October 22nd in London, will host insider presentations and debate from analysts, chief security officers, business continuity managers and consultants on the threats to organisations and the new service-centric delivery models. Topics under discussion will include:
• Lost or exposed data |
• Security holes in packaged software |
• Malicious viruses |
• Hacking by professional criminals |
• Social engineering |
• Phishing scams |
• Power outages |
• Server failure |
Click here to register for your free place at the event
