Case 1: Government Attacks, Incident Management

Stuxnet

The Stuxnet worm is an example of the possible damage that a government-funded cyberattack can do to the infrastructure of another country.  Stuxnet, a worm most likely engineered by Israeli and American intelligence specialists, had a focused target - centrifuges in Iranian nuclear facilities.  Utilizing their knowledge of Iran’s hardware, Stuxnet targeted centrifuges and programmed them to spin out of control, causing damage, and pushing back Iran’s efforts to become nuclear.  This illuminates a possible future of cyberwarfare.  Huge amounts of damage was done to Iran’s facilities, and this was only a targeted attack.  If left unprotected, a more general attack of Stuxnet’s sophistication could wreak havoc on the American infrastructure.  (For the full story of Stuxnet, see NY Times)

South Korea

An attack on South Korean government networks caused a large-scale distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS), which is when an Internet location is saturated with artificial traffic, making its resources unusable.  This was likely perpetrated by North Korean affiliated attackers, causing disruptions in communication, data storage, and government resources.  There was also a concentrated attack on a large South Korean bank.  (For the full story, see Channel News Asia)

Case 3: Individual Information, Identity Management

VA Attack

On May 3, 2006, an employee of the Department of Veterans Affairs had his laptop stolen, with 26.5 million names and social security numbers compromised.  The theft marked the largest information security breach in government history, and it was simply a laptop stolen from one analyst’s home.  This is a case of the physical infrastructure becoming an issue as well - if data is unprotected in certain physical locations, then part of our cybersecurity measures must be to protect these sensitive pieces of hardware.  Not all cybersecurity breaches take place over cyberspace. (For the full story, see Washington Post)

The John Harrison Case

John Harrison was a victim of online identity theft, and the thief spent $265,000 in four months, using Harrison’s stolen identity.  While the thief has since been caught and put in prison for three years, Harrison is still $140,000 in debt on purchases that he did not make.  Harrison serves as an example of what identity theft can do to just one person.  Meanwhile, 10 million Americans were victims of identity theft last year, and while not every case is as severe as John Harrison’s, this demonstrates a serious problem of identity management for individuals.  (For the full story, see CBS News)