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- Trend snippet: The human factor as a vital but weak link in cybersecurity requires testing and practise
Trends in Security Information
The HSD Trendmonitor is designed to provide access to relevant content on various subjects in the safety and security domain, to identify relevant developments and to connect knowledge and organisations. The safety and security domain encompasses a vast number of subjects. Four relevant taxonomies (type of threat or opportunity, victim, source of threat and domain of application) have been constructed in order to visualize all of these subjects. The taxonomies and related category descriptions have been carefully composed according to other taxonomies, European and international standards and our own expertise.
In order to identify safety and security related trends, relevant reports and HSD news articles are continuously scanned, analysed and classified by hand according to the four taxonomies. This results in a wide array of observations, which we call ‘Trend Snippets’. Multiple Trend Snippets combined can provide insights into safety and security trends. The size of the circles shows the relative weight of the topic, the filters can be used to further select the most relevant content for you. If you have an addition, question or remark, drop us a line at info@securitydelta.nl.
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The human factor as a vital but weak link in cybersecurity requires testing and practise
- organizations must have enough people on staff: minimal reliance on external parties
- people hired must be qualified for the job: personal must have mastered yesterday's technology, but be ready to work with the technology of today and tomorrow
- effective employee screening: government services must be kept secure
It is vital to keep conducting drills and surprise the organization with things like pen tests form outside the organization, mystery guests, external ethical hackers and more.
security has pride of place on our 2019 agenda, but it has in fact been among our top priorities for years.’ Visser explains that there has been some development within the theme of digital security. ‘We began conducting our investigations fifteen years ago. We found that many people who were operating the Dutch government's IT systems were either unqualified or lacking in the necessary expertise. There are still vast improvements to be made there. We then began examining the critical national Digital security has been a top priority for years The Netherlands Court of Audit is the independent external controller whose role is set out in the country's constitution. It is the only external organisation entitled to unlimited access for the purpose of its investigations. This, combined with a broad interpretation of its remit, yields an organisation with an intense interest in digital security. Visser: ‘We draw up our own agenda, in which we take societal developments into account. Digital infrastructure processes in all departments, at which point we discovered all manner of problems. Recently, we launched a series of special investigations aimed specifically at the vital sectors. Last year, for instance, we published the results of an investigation into the cybersecurity of our water management structures.’ The human factor Visser asserts that there is more to cybersecurity than technology alone. ‘The human factor is vital to achieving effective cybersecurity. There are three levels here. First of all, organisations must have enough people on staff. We see that the government is frequently understaffed, as a result of which some executive services depend on external parties for 50% or more of their personnel needs. Next, the people you have hired must also be properly qualified for their jobs. They need to have mastered yesterday's technology, of course, but should also – and more importantly – be ready to work with the technology of today and tomorrow. And lastly, effective employee screening is vital. Government services deal with information that must be kept secure, meaning not just anyone should be able to access it. This is not only a matter of privacy, but also state secrets in the form of economic and military information.’ People, says Visser, are in fact the weakest link in any given area. ‘Whatever steps you take towards cybersecurity today are sure to be obsolete tomorrow. That's why it's vital to keep conducting drills and surprising yourself with things like pen tests from outside the organisation, mystery guests, external ethical hackers and more. My advice is to test, test and test again. You must be willing to subject your own systems to scrutiny rather than putting blind faith in how they look on paper. While there's no way to achieve 100% cybersecurity, that doesn't mean it shouldn't be our goal.’