The following article written by Alex Ryals, Tech Data’s vice president Security Solutions, originally appeared on Tech Data’s LinkedIn page on January 25, 2019. It is the third article in his three-part discussion on cybersecurity.

The following article originally appeared on Tech Data’s LinkedIn page on December 19, 2018. It is the second in a three-part series on cybersecurity, written by Alex Ryals, Tech Data’s vice president Security Solutions. In this discussion Alex addresses unique considerations for companies operating in vertical markets.

The following article originally appeared on Tech Data’s LinkedIn page on November 27, 2018. It is the first in a three-part series on cybersecurity, written by Alex Ryals, Tech Data’s vice president Security Solutions.

Growing up, spy thrillers were among my favorite movies. There was Sean Connery as the sophisticated James Bond, in classics like Goldfinger and later, Roger Moore in The Spy Who Loved Me. Then, fast-forward 30 years to a new breed of spy with the unassuming Jason Bourne of the Bourne Trilogy. Although unique in their styles, all the characters exemplified grace under pressure and an uncanny intuition of knowing when they were being watched and how to slip

Meltdown and Spectre are read-only attacks or disclosure attacks. In other words, these exploits do not directly force code execution in the OS kernel, in other virtual machines or other programs. However, one could possibly use information gathered from these attacks to feed it into a code execution attack.  The primary risk is in stealing information versus controlling a system.

Most likely you have already heard the devastating news of the cyber-attack against Equifax in mid-May.  Although the world didn’t find out about the breach until mid-September, the impact to individuals was tremendous with the exfiltration of names, addresses, SSNs and birth dates for over 145.5M people. However, despite all the media coverage, CreditCards.com reports that only about 61 million Americans—just over a quarter of all consumers—checked their credit score or credit report in the two weeks following the breach. In other words, the majority of Americas are doing very little to protect themselves despite the clear warnings as a result of this catastrophic incident.

Have you ever wondered if the bad guys are really trying to compromise your corporate network or those of your customers?  With all the potential targets out there, surely it’s the other guys who have to worry, right? A customer told me the other day that budgets are tight this year and he has so many priorities, that he feels like he has to take his chances with cyber security right now.  He has a firewall after all.