Showing posts with label RSA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label RSA. Show all posts

August 20, 2011

Cloud Second, Security First

Leadership is not about moving forward despite any and all costs, but about addressing issues head on.

Cloud computing holds tremendous promise for efficiency and cost-savings at a time when these issues are front and center of a national debate on our deficit of $14 trillion and growing.

Yet some prominent IT leaders have sought to downplay security concerns calling them "amplified...to preserve the status quo." (ComputerWorld, 8 August 2011)

Interestingly, this statement appeared in the press the same week that McAfee reported Operation Shady RAT--"the hacking of more than 70 corporations and government organizations," 49 of which were in the U.S., and included a dozen defense firms. (Washington Post, 2 August 2011)
The cyber spying took place over a period of 5 years and "led to a massive loss of information."(Fox News, 4 August 2011)

Moreover, this cyber security tragedy stands not alone, but atop a long list that recently includes prominent organizations in the IT community, such as Google that last year had it's networks broken into and valuable source code stolen, and EMC's RSA division this year that had their SecurID computer tokens compromised.

Perhaps, we should pay greater heed to our leading cyber security expert who just this last March stated: "our adversaries in cyberspace are highly capable. Our defenses--across dot-mil and the defense industrial base (DIB) are not." (NSA Director and head of Cyber Command General Keith Alexander).

We need to press forward with cloud computing, but be ever careful about protecting our critical infrastructure along the way.

One of the great things about our nation is our ability to share viewpoints, discuss and debate them, and use all information to improve decision-making along the way. We should never close our eyes to the the threats on the ground.

(Source Photo: here)

Share/Save/Bookmark