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December 10, 2014

2014's Tech Nightmares: From Sony Hack to iCloud Nudes

There was little doubt that 2014 was a huge year for technology. Plenty of things happened, plenty of developments arrived, plenty of exciting new concepts were advanced. Some came to fruition, others did not. But in a field so thick with advances, there must too be some drawbacks. Into each life some rain must fall, as the old song once said, and the tech sector was no different. Continuum recently compiled a list of the 12 biggest disasters in information technology (IT) for 2014, and it was a list fraught with horrors many would rather be forgotten.

The list could be essentially broken down into two classes: nightmares from within—problems caused by bugs in various systems that could be exploited later—and nightmares from without, as hackers reared their collective head to bring horror to an otherwise pleasant day. Several bugs, including the Heartbleed password leak, the Poodle Bug, the Shellshock Bug and the Bash Bug all made the list of 12 great horrors of 2014.

But beyond the bugs were some of the biggest news items of the year. The Sony Pictures Entertainment hack led the way, followed, by the breach at Healthcare.gov, the array of corporate hacks from eBay (News - Alert) to Domino's Pizza, the Home Depot data breach, the iCloud nude picture leaks, the JP Morgan (News - Alert) data breach, and the dual issues of Cryptolocker and Cryptowall.

Continuum went so far as to make a video running down these events, and while the video itself is somewhat light-hearted in tone, it must be made clear—which Continuum did via senior vice president for acquisition and CMO Jeanne Hopkins—that the events that comprise the list were anything but light-hearted. It becomes particularly important, Hopkins elaborated, to note the importance of working with managed service providers to get the best in security, because issues similar to these can be addressed early on and prevent business from coming to, as Hopkins put it “...a crippling halt.”

It's easy to forget the biggest blows to security, especially after the initial damage has been repaired, but it's videos like this one, and the concepts behind such videos that remind us that the price of online peace of mind is eternal vigilance. Talking to the MSPs, keeping up the antivirus systems, letting the firewalls do the job, and so on go a long way toward preventing many of these disasters before such can really become disasters in the first place. Sometimes it can be hard to establish the appropriate level of security; as the Continuum video points out, “given the choice between dancing pigs and security, users will pick dancing pigs every time.” Essentially, people want a bit of a break built into the everyday, and a funny video is a great way to get it. Indeed, a break in the everyday has actually been proven a boon to productivity in general as averaged over the long term. But sometimes that break can come at a pretty high price, particularly if that funny video is sent as an email attachment that also contains a virus or a Trojan or the like.

With so much at stake—privacy destroyed, nude pictures disseminated widely, sensitive information stolen or held for ransom—it's easy to see why such things are important. While most of us may believe that such a thing would never happen to us, it's the kind of thing that can happen to anyone, and as such, needs to be prepared for and protected against.




Edited by Maurice Nagle
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