Why A World Leading Cyber Professional Won’t Use Her Own Network
When the Australian Centre for Cyber Security (ACCS) opened earlier this year in Canberra, it instantly became the target for cyber attacks. The new Director, Professor Jill Slay, decided to take a fresh approach. After decades of working in cyber forensics, she went back to basics, as she told Global Government Forum:
‘I thought that, even if everything I do is in the public domain, why do I want to put all my files on a server anyway?’
So now she has a laptop. Since one hard drive is the point of failure, she has an external hard drive as well and that is it. As she explains: ‘This is my new plan. I won’t actually save anything anywhere. Anybody can infiltrate the network but they won’t find a thing.’
This is part of a realignment by one of the most experienced cyber professionals in the world. ‘If the current paradigms that we use don’t work – defence in depth and all these anti-virus devices – maybe we should go back to first principles and start again. I think the basic question is why do we put all this stuff on the internet anyway? We’ve got used to having the potential of connecting our control systems to our corporate networks for billing.
‘Let’s stop doing things that are convenient if we accept that there is an enemy out there who is trying to steal from us and damage us. The problem is huge – and it’s maybe going to get bigger.’
Her view is that governments are using the cloud for convenience and cost but the result is going to be a major catastrophe when cloud storage is either stolen or destroyed. For the full interview with Professor Jill Slay click here.
About Graham Scott
Graham is an experienced editor and publisher and an award-winning writer. He has travelled extensively and is interested in world cultures.
Related Posts
