The Cyber Threat

Conquering cyber attacks requires a multi-sector, multi-modal approach Cyber Threat! How to Manage the Growing Risk of Cyber Attacks is an in-depth examination of the very real cyber security risks facing all facets of government and industry, and the various factors that must align to maintain information integrity. Written by one of the nation's most highly respected cyber risk analysts, the book describes how businesses and government agencies must protect their most valuable assets to avoid potentially catastrophic consequences. Much more than just cyber security, the necessary solutions require government and industry to work cooperatively and intelligently. This resource reveals the extent of the problem, and provides a plan to change course and better manage and protect critical information. Recent news surrounding cyber hacking operations show how intellectual property theft is now a matter of national security, as well as economic and commercial security. Consequences are far-reaching, and can have enormous effects on national economies and international relations. Aggressive cyber forces in China, Russia, Eastern Europe and elsewhere, the rise of global organized criminal networks, and inattention to vulnerabilities throughout critical infrastructures converge to represent an abundantly clear threat. Managing the threat and keeping information safe is now a top priority for global businesses and government agencies. Cyber Threat! breaks the issue down into real terms, and proposes an approach to effective defense. Topics include: The information at risk The true extent of the threat The potential consequences across sectors The multifaceted approach to defense The growing cyber threat is fundamentally changing the nation's economic, diplomatic, military, and intelligence operations, and will extend into future technological, scientific, and geopolitical influence. The only effective solution will be expansive and complex, encompassing every facet of government and industry. Cyber Threat! details the situation at hand, and provides the information that can help keep the nation safe.

What do business leaders need to know about the cyber threat to their operations? Author Bob Gourley, the Director of Intelligence in the first Department of Defense cyber defense organization and lead for cyber intelligence at Cognitio Corp shares lessons from direct contact with adversaries in cyberspace in a new book titled “The Cyber Threat” (newly updated for 2015) Understanding the Cyber Threat is critical to preparing your defenses prior to attack and also instrumental in mounting a defense during attack. Reading this book will teach you things your adversaries wish you did not know and in doing so will enhance your ability to defend against cyber attack. The book explores the threat and the role of the emerging discipline of Cyber Intelligence as a way of making threat information actionable in support of your business objectives. "When I'm researching my own books, I always turn to Bob Gourley. I make diasasters up. He's seen them for real. And most important, he knows how to stop them. Read this. It'll scare you, but also protect you." · Brad Meltzer, #1 bestselling author of The Inner Circle "The insights Bob provides in The Cyber Threat are an essential first step in developing your cyber defense solution." · Keith Alexander, General, USA (Ret), Former Director, NSA, and Commander, US Cyber Command "There are no excuses anymore. Trying to run a business without awareness of the cyber threat is asking to be fired. The Cyber Threat succinctly articulates insights you need to know right now." · Scott McNealy, Co-founder and Former CEO, Sun Microsystems and Chairman Wayin. "Vaguely uneasy about your cyber security but stumped about what to do? Easy. READ THIS BOOK! "The Cyber Threat" will open your mind to a new domain and how you can make yourself safer in it." · Michael Hayden, General, USAF (Ret), Former Director, NSA and Director, CIA "Bob Gourley was one of the first intelligence specialists to understand the complex threats and frightening scope, and importance of the cyber threat. His book can give you the edge in what has emerged as one of the most compelling, mind-bending and fast moving issues of our time." · Bill Studeman, Admiral, USN (Ret), Former Director, NSA and Deputy Director, CIA "The Cyber Threat captures insights into dynamic adversaries that businesses and governments everywhere should be working to defeat. Knowing the threat and one's own defenses are the first steps in winning this battle." · Mike McConnell, Admiral, USN (Ret), Former Director of National Intelligence and Director, NSA Written by a career intelligence professional and enterprise CTO, this book was made for enterprise professionals including technology and business executives who know they must mitigate a growing threat.

Modern society depends critically on computers that control and manage the systems on which we depend in many aspects of our daily lives. While this provides conveniences of a level unimaginable just a few years ago, it also leaves us vulnerable to attacks on the computers managing these systems. In recent times the explosion in cyber attacks, including viruses, worms, and intrusions, has turned this vulnerability into a clear and visible threat. Due to the escalating number and increased sophistication of cyber attacks, it has become important to develop a broad range of techniques, which can ensure that the information infrastructure continues to operate smoothly, even in the presence of dire and continuous threats. This book brings together the latest techniques for managing cyber threats, developed by some of the world’s leading experts in the area. The book includes broad surveys on a number of topics, as well as specific techniques. It provides an excellent reference point for researchers and practitioners in the government, academic, and industrial communities who want to understand the issues and challenges in this area of growing worldwide importance.

Threat intelligence is a surprisingly complex topic that goes far beyond the obvious technical challenges of collecting, modelling and sharing technical indicators. Most books in this area focus mainly on technical measures to harden a system based on threat intel data and limit their scope to single organizations only. This book provides a unique angle on the topic of national cyber threat intelligence and security information sharing. It also provides a clear view on ongoing works in research laboratories world-wide in order to address current security concerns at national level. It allows practitioners to learn about upcoming trends, researchers to share current results, and decision makers to prepare for future developments.

"In 1961, Leonard Kleinrock submitted to the MIT a PhD thesis entitled: "Information Flow in Large Communication Nets"1, an innovative idea for message exchanging procedures, based on the concept of post-office packet delivery procedures. It was the seed of ARPANET, a wide area data communication network, implemented in 1969, considered the origin of the Internet. At the end of the 1970's, digital transmission and packet-switching allowed the building of ISDN (Integrated Services Data Networks). Voice and data were integrated in the same network, given birth to electronic offices combining computation and communication technologies. The electronic miniaturization and the popularization of micro-computers in the 1980's, brought computer communication to home, allowing the integration and automation of many domestic tasks and access to some daily facilities from home. A new technological breakthrough came in 1989, when Tim Berners-Lee, a British scientist working at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), conceived the world wide web (www), easing the communication between machines around the world2. Nowadays, combining Kleinrock and Berners-Lee seminal ideas for network hardware and software, Internet became all pervasive in the daily life around the world, transforming the old telephone set into a small multipurpose computer. Consequently, human life radically changed. Our dependence on computer networks became undeniable and together with it, harmful programs or malwares, developedtodamagemachinesortostealinformation, represent permanent threat toindividuals and society. In computer science a new work research line emerged: cyber-security,which includes developing models, routines and software to protect machines and networks from malicious programs. This new discipline has attracted researchers to develop ideas for protecting people and corporations. Cyber-security is the object of this book, that presents hints about how the community is working to manage these threats: Mathematical models based on epidemiology studies, Control of malwares and virus propagation, Protection of essential service plants to assure reliability, the direct impact of virus and malwares over human activities and behavior, Government entities which are highly concerned with the necessary preventive actions. As cyber-security is a new and wide subject, the intention was to give a general idea of some points, leaving to the readers the task to go ahead"--

Cyber-Security Threats, Actors, and Dynamic Mitigation provides both a technical and state-of-the-art perspective as well as a systematic overview of the recent advances in different facets of cyber-security. It covers the methodologies for modeling attack strategies used by threat actors targeting devices, systems, and networks such as smart homes, critical infrastructures, and industrial IoT. With a comprehensive review of the threat landscape, the book explores both common and sophisticated threats to systems and networks. Tools and methodologies are presented for precise modeling of attack strategies, which can be used both proactively in risk management and reactively in intrusion prevention and response systems. Several contemporary techniques are offered ranging from reconnaissance and penetration testing to malware detection, analysis, and mitigation. Advanced machine learning-based approaches are also included in the area of anomaly-based detection, that are capable of detecting attacks relying on zero-day vulnerabilities and exploits. Academics, researchers, and professionals in cyber-security who want an in-depth look at the contemporary aspects of the field will find this book of interest. Those wanting a unique reference for various cyber-security threats and how they are detected, analyzed, and mitigated will reach for this book often.

This book provides readers with up-to-date research of emerging cyber threats and defensive mechanisms, which are timely and essential. It covers cyber threat intelligence concepts against a range of threat actors and threat tools (i.e. ransomware) in cutting-edge technologies, i.e., Internet of Things (IoT), Cloud computing and mobile devices. This book also provides the technical information on cyber-threat detection methods required for the researcher and digital forensics experts, in order to build intelligent automated systems to fight against advanced cybercrimes. The ever increasing number of cyber-attacks requires the cyber security and forensic specialists to detect, analyze and defend against the cyber threats in almost real-time, and with such a large number of attacks is not possible without deeply perusing the attack features and taking corresponding intelligent defensive actions – this in essence defines cyber threat intelligence notion. However, such intelligence would not be possible without the aid of artificial intelligence, machine learning and advanced data mining techniques to collect, analyze, and interpret cyber-attack campaigns which is covered in this book. This book will focus on cutting-edge research from both academia and industry, with a particular emphasis on providing wider knowledge of the field, novelty of approaches, combination of tools and so forth to perceive reason, learn and act on a wide range of data collected from different cyber security and forensics solutions. This book introduces the notion of cyber threat intelligence and analytics and presents different attempts in utilizing machine learning and data mining techniques to create threat feeds for a range of consumers. Moreover, this book sheds light on existing and emerging trends in the field which could pave the way for future works. The inter-disciplinary nature of this book, makes it suitable for a wide range of audiences with backgrounds in artificial intelligence, cyber security, forensics, big data and data mining, distributed systems and computer networks. This would include industry professionals, advanced-level students and researchers that work within these related fields.

Exploring the negative social impact of cyber-attacks, this book takes a closer look at the challenges faced by both the public and private sectors of the financial industry. It is widely known amongst senior executives in both sectors that cybercrime poses a real threat, however effective collaboration between individual financial institutions and the public sector into detecting, monitoring and responding to cyber-attacks remains limited. Addressing this problem, the authors present the results from a series of interviews with cybersecurity professionals based in Canada in order to better understand the potential risks and threats that financial institutions are facing in the digital age. Offering policy recommendations for improving cybersecurity protection measures within financial institutions, and enhancing the sharing of information between the public and private sector, this book is a timely and invaluable read for those researching financial services, cybercrime and risk management, as well as finance professionals interested in cybersecurity.