FBI SOS

I touched on my annoyance a bit last week at the magical status that cybercrime "hackers" have achieved in the mass media. I'd like to continue that thought this week with my opinion on the most important link in the chain of information security, that's you. The most secure systems in the world won't be if the human element isn’t trained and educated to properly control the system and the information.

In October of this year the FBI released a new educational website with grade-specific lessons for youth concerning internet safety, the FBI-SOS Internet Challenge. First, since I myself am little more than an overgrown child, I have to say that this website is actually pretty awesome. We’re all familiar with the typical “uncool” after school special types of lessons that get pushed to kids, and while the FBI site does push itself a little further into Dungeons and Dragons territory than might be desirable, overall it is a very cool educational tool.

The “internet talk” is fast becoming a requirement of raising a child, and that cornerstone is the education part of the McCumber Cube. Kids will figure things out, hell the only reason I’m so good with computers is because of the amount of time I spent as a kid trying to circumvent the restrictions my father put in place on the family computer. More explicit educational material like this website would have been helpful, and I hope it’s something that schools and parents can take advantage of. The internet is a wild west, or as the FBI sees it, a magical island.

FBI site: https://sos.fbi.gov/

Sextortion: Did you know about this?

Extorting sex online, that can happen and it can happen easily. A lot of emphasis is put on words like “hacker” in the media, and these discussions generally do little to help people understand real threats. Instead they make computers seem like magic, and hackers seem like wizards wielding mystical nerd powers. How can people protect against something they don’t understand?

Sextortion is a new online threat, and one that has been made far easier with the advances in social media technology and prevalence. The issue is with privacy, confidentiality, and the integrity of personal data. People comfortable post all sorts of information online without any thought or worry. We make sure our firewalls are turned on, and that our antivirus software is updated, because that stops the “hackers,” right?

Wrong. In a story from the FBI Cyber Crimes Stories Blog from February of this year, the bureau detailed the new threat of sextortion, and despite the story there displaying some level of magic hackery, there is no requirement for such. A criminal does not need to exploit your computer to gain access to your phone number, your address, your interests, what you were doing last week, or any time of personal information, they just need you to post it on Facebook first.

And this is why it is important to have these discussions with children, educate them about the threats that exist online. Once something is on the internet, it is always on the internet.

FBI Article Reference: http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2012/february/sextortion_021012/sextortion_021012

Welcome to the world of InfoSecMgmt. This first post is just a brief intro to the topic, myself, and my experience. Over the course of the semester I will be exploring Information Security Management. This is my first official forray into such