Threats to Mobile Devices and the IoT Will Grow in 2017
From edtechmagazine.com
January 27, 2017
Are universities prepared for the threats outlined in Intel Security”s 2017 prediction report?
by Meghan Bogardus Cortez
Excerpts:
t”s no surprise that security is top of mind as a new year (and semester) begins for those at higher education institutions. EDUCAUSE named information security their top IT issue of 2017. TIME has predicted that this year hackers may start to use artificial intelligence to make cyberattacks even easier to execute.
So how can universities be prepared for the incoming threats? Well, knowing what these threats could be might help.
“These attacks are becoming more frequent and more significant. Even the large universities with the most justifiable infrastructure defense practices in place are not necessarily going to be able to prevent hacking,” says Sharon Pitt, CIO at Binghamton University in New York, who is a member of EDUCAUSE”s Higher Education Information Security Council Advisory Committee.
In December, Intel Security and McAfee Labs released their 2017 Threats Predictions report. While some predicted threats, like dronejacking, may not relate directly to higher ed, many of their predictions do. SNIP
Mobile Malware Threatens Huge Numbers of Devices
A recent survey by CampusBooks.com found that 94 percent of students own smartphones, a higher percentage than those who own laptops. Intel”s prediction that mobile malware will grow this year could have a huge impact on college campuses.
“We have so many people bringing endpoint devices into our campus network environment, and we don”t necessarily have control over that,” says Pitt. “We have required training for university employees, but that doesn”t touch the students.” SNIP
Cyberattacks on the Internet of Things Are Forthcoming
Intel predicts the IoT will reach 1.8 billion devices by 2019 and furthermore believes security threats to these devices will be growing quickly.
University researchers at Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University and Stanford University are already using IoT for research.
“Our first best practice is to make sure we aren”t putting IoT devices into our environment with their default passwords,” says Pitt. “Hackers can easily take advantage of those vulnerabilities.” SNIP
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