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Kaseya was warned of security flaws years before attack
Wednesday, July 14, 2021
On 3 July, US President Joe Biden announced that he was directing the “full resources of the government to assist in the response to the attack". Although he said government isn’t sure of who is behind the attack, Kaseya has acknowledged receipt of a ransom note from REvil, the group that was behind the JBS USA ransomware attack. The White House has said the US will take action against the gangs involved, if the Russian government doesn't.
Ilia Kolochenko, founder of ImmuniWeb and a member of Europol Data Protection Experts Network, issued a caveat: “Counter-attacks against sovereign states, performed without a convincing attack attribution based on sound evidence of the original aggression, will contradict Tallinn Manual and will likely violate international law."
Moreover, he said any attacked countries will probably retaliate with nation-backed hacking campaigns that may rapidly create chaos and national disaster by damaging critical infrastructure including hospitals, airports, gas or water supply chains.
"Worse, Western countries have highly digitalised economies, being specifically susceptible and vulnerable to large-scale cyber-attacks. Eventually, many innocent US citizens may fall victims to the spiralling cyber war.”
He added that counter-operations in digital space will not treat the root cause of ransomware, such as largely ignored cyber security hygiene, omnipresent carelessness and underestimation of cyber risks.
“The money spent on offensive operations would be better off spent on hardening national cyber defence capacities including the creation of cyber security awareness and support programs for SMEs. Finally, to catch up with the EU, the US should finally consider implementing federal data protection and privacy law that has been expected for over a decade. Prevention, regulation and cyber defence is a key to sustainable protection of any country, while cyber war is a reliable recipe to multiply losses and brings no desired outcomes.” Read Full Article
CPO Magazine: European Union Proposes a Joint Cyber Response Unit To Coordinate Reaction to Security Incidents
