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As hack after hack makes the news, with the data of millions being stolen regularly, it becomes increasingly apparent that, once digitized, information can never be stated as fully secure. With new vulnerabilities constantly being reported, it’s not even fully clear as to which aspects of security should first be focused on for improvement. This problem is also only anticipated to get worse as, according to a prediction from Cisco, the use of networked devices is expected to increase from 17.1 billion connected devices in 2016 to 27.1 billion devices in 2021.
In response to this rapid growth, the question is being raised as to whether it may be of benefit to respond by deliberately slowing down our rate of adoption, taking the time to formulate new laws and standards for security, and preserving analog alternatives for key technologies.
Writing for the Harvard Business Review, Andrew Burt, Chief Privacy Officer at Immuta, and Dan Geer, Chief Information Security Officer at In-Q-Tel, offer three suggestions to guide this slowdown, with the intent of improving security, focusing on:
- The introduction of laws requiring any item capable of network connectivity either having a finite lifespan or be capable of accepting updates
- Establishing clear liability for cybersecurity flaws, and holding the organizations responsible for buggy code to account.
- Preserving analog alternatives to digital options, to allow separate and isolated technologies in the event of digital failures.
Source:
https://hbr.org/2019/02/improving-cybersecurity-means-taking-more-care-with-what-we-digitize
