The U.S. government is appealing to citizens’ sense of technological duty this fall.
Earlier in October, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the beginning of National Cyber Security Awareness Month 2014 as “an effort to increase the American public’s understanding of basic cybersecurity practices and the role each of us plays in keeping cyberspace safe and secure.”
A number of awareness events are scheduled throughout the country this month. The campaign kicked off in Tennessee, while vendors in the active security space continue the stream of product announcements aimed at protecting businesses from a range of digital threats.
Seeing cybersecurity as a complex task that is the responsibility of all technology users, DHS emphasizes the following tips for online protection:
- Keep your operating system, browser, and other critical software optimized by installing updates.
- Maintain an open dialogue with your family, friends, and community about Internet safety.
- Limit the amount of personal information you post online and use privacy settings to avoid sharing information widely.
- Be cautious about what you receive or read online—if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
X Close
According a DHS release, “Cybersecurity is a critical component of the nation’s economic wellbeing and has become an integral part of our collective national security. Both essential services and critical infrastructure increasingly rely on cyber networks and systems.”
“Today our nation’s cyber networks are as much a part of the American homeland as they are indispensable to modern life in America—the very backbone of our 21st century economy and a major nerve center of our national security,” said Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson. “Cybersecurity is a shared responsibility. Every one of us must practice basic cybersecurity because an intrusion into one computer can affect an entire network.”
WHITEPAPER: Prevent and detect cyber-attacks from the inside out with a real-time look at who accesses your network (Click to download)
The campaign covers some of the most intriguing trends in IT. In Nashville, DHS joined the National Association of State Chief Information Officers to kick-off the effort. On Oct. 15, The San Diego Cyber Center of Excellence will host a forum on the security challenges posed by the Internet of Things.
Security is an endless mission, of course, and the San Diego organization will continue its promotion of cyber awareness with an event in early November. According to a release, keynote speaker “Alan Paller, Director of Research for the SANS Institute, will offer an early look at how changing technologies and revelations about underlying causes of security failures are reshaping the practice of cybersecurity….The Washington Post called Alan “one of seven people worth knowing in cybersecurity.”
As think tanks and government officials urge the public’s attention toward cyber issues, vendors announce new solutions to the swirling threats that strip data from companies nationwide.
General Dynamics and Bit9 + Carbon Black have teamed to protect the defense giant’s data with Carbon Black’s threat detection, prevention, and response capabilities. As stated in a release, “General Dynamics Fidelis’ Network Defense and Forensics (NDF) team, a team of incident response and forensic experts, use Carbon Black to supplement the network visibility, analysis, and control provided by Fidelis XPS, its flagship network security solution. This allows the NDF team to pinpoint each endpoint and server on which malware has landed and reveal the entire ‘kill chain’ of the attack, so they can quickly identify where and how the attack originated.”
Citizens can learn more about cyber security at the DHS website.