With Council of Economic Advisers Assessment Pegging Cost at $110 Billion and Citing Finance as Most Vulnerable Sector, Stern Calls for Amping Up the Vigilance
LOS ANGELES (March 5, 2018) – With a new report confirming that cyberattacks are battering the economy, Adam Stern, founder and CEO of cloud hosting pioneer Infinitely Virtual, is calling on businesses – especially those in the finance sector – to redouble their commitment to proactive measures and to rethink their estimation of the threat.
Malicious cyber activity cost the U.S. economy nearly $110 billion in 2016, according to a new report from the White House Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) – and within private industry, cyberattacks hit the finance sector hardest.
The estimate is part of a CEA assessment of the impact of cyberattacks on the federal government and American businesses, as reported in Bloomberg Businessweek. The industries comprising the largest shares of the GDP saw the highest shares of security breaches in 2016, according to the report. That includes manufacturing, government, healthcare and finance, “which had the highest breaches of all industries,” Businessweek noted.
Addressing the attacks, the CEA said this: “Cyber threats are ever-evolving and may come from sophisticated adversaries. Due to common vulnerabilities, instances of security breaches occur across firms and in patterns that are difficult to anticipate.”
“On balance, I could not agree with the CEA more,” Stern said. “Adversaries are indeed growing in sophistication, threats morph and metastasize, and countermeasures become more complex with each passing day/week/month. And while it’s technically true that specific patterns are difficult to anticipate, the right response isn’t resignation but resolve. That’s why we recommend that all of our customers treat security as a process, not an event.”
“Security is also a mindset,” Stern noted. “Achieving an optimum level of security requires a specific frame of mind that the organization needs to understand and then internalize. It doesn’t matter if you’re engaged in ‘routine’ tasks – every organization is more and less secure over time. The process of security means adjusting and learning accordingly. A casual approach ensures that an organization will become less secure. Consider a strategic approach to security as a form of corporate physical fitness. In other words, it’s something companies must do absolutely every day.”
Among the elements of a basic cybersecurity routine: setting password expirations, obtaining certificates, avoiding the use of public networks, meeting with staff about security, and so on. “Perfection in countering cyberattacks is as elusive here as it is in any other endeavor,” Stern said. “Even so, that can’t be an argument for complacence or anything less than maximum due diligence, backed up by the most capable technology at each organization’s disposal.”
To speak with Adam Stern, please email: admin@edgecommunicationsinc.com.
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Infinitely Virtual is a leading provider of high quality and affordable Cloud Server technology, capable of delivering services to any type of business, via terminal servers, SharePoint servers and SQL servers – all based on Cloud Servers. Ranked #28th on the Talkin’ Cloud 100 roster of premier hosting providers, Infinitely Virtual has earned the highest rating of “Enterprise-Ready™” in Skyhigh Networks’ CloudTrust™ Program for four of its offerings — Cloud Server Hosting, InfiniteVault, InfiniteProtect and Virtual Terminal Server. The company recently took the #1 spot in HostReview’s Ranking of VPS hosting providers. Infinitely Virtual was established as a subsidiary of Altay Corporation, and through this partnership, the company provides customers with expert 24×7 technical support. More information about Infinitely Virtual can be found at: http://www.infinitelyvirtual.com, @iv_cloudhosting, or call 866-257-8455.
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Ken Greenberg
Edge Communications, Inc.
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ken@edgecommunicationsinc.com
