Theyeat zaremos this new article as an extension of the previous article «The Perfect Digital Storm». This time we will focus on the analysis of how this storm affects people and families, on humanity’s return path to the 4th industrial revolution, where we all go in the direction of digital transformation, being aware of it or not. After the current pandemia isover, we will see how the next steps materialize, since COVID19, will only be a splinter that allows usirá to visualize as a antechamber of the new reality that we must begin to face together as humanity.
Throughout the article I will try to solve the question of whether individuals and families are prepared to face the cybersecurity risks and challenges of this storm of transformation.. Itry to turn new threats into competitive advantagess or opportunities for people into this new reality.
Cybersecurity Professionals
Today we see a lack of training of cybersecurity professionals around the world and in direct contracting, there is a sustained increase in new cybercriminals supported by new technologies and acting without borders taking advantage of the general ignorance in society of the risks involved in massive access to the Internet or extreme digitization. In a study by the professional cybersecurity specialist organization (ISC)2, they indicate that, at the current pace, the need or demand for global cybersecurity specialists will increase dramatically and reach 1.8 million by 2022. In Chile, universities do not yet produce all the professionals necessary to meet this explosive local demand, as is the Academic Coordinator, Center for Studies in Computer Law, Faculty of Law, University of Chile in the OAS report of risk reporting, advances in Cybersecurity.
LIn the absence of training of professionals creates an effect in which the most urgent need in private or strategic government areas is first met, leaving the demand for knowledge of the discovered society, also creating an urgent need for massification and democratization of the risks of cybersecurity in all families,, and especially today that parents are changing their way to teleworkor, with children digitizing at very early stages of life and who have access to mobile phones from very young as we will see later.
The more people’s access to the Internet, the greater the risk
Accordingtothe OAS report mentioned earlier in this article, Chile leads access to the Internet by number of inhabitants in Latin America, in contrast to the lack of professionals and few training alternatives in the field of Cybersecurity. On the other hand, as another background, in 2020 in the middle of the pandemic, Chile was the country that used social networks the most during the first weeks of confinement, according to figures from the Spanish portal es.statista.com,for every 100 inhabitants, approximately 80 recorded access to social networks, the highest figure in SouthAmerica.
In the early days of the pandemic, according to the site es.statista.com, Chile ranked first in social media use in Latin America, on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter increasing its use by 53%.
The degree of exposure of people is a breeding ground for cybersecurity risks, given the existence of a gap in knowledge and prevention,, the vast majority of families are not aware of the risks to which their members are exposed,nor how to avoid them.
Increased cyberattacks in Pandemic:
According to Fortinet (Network and Firewall Security Expert Company), its 7th-on-year global report indicates that more than 600 new phishing campaigns have been generated since the start of the pandemic. The strategy used is to send messages and emails with malicious links that lead the user to disclose personal and banking data on falsors websites among others. More than 344 million cyberattack attempts have been detected in Chile during the first quarter,where phishing registers the top increase with 131%. «Thisquarter we have seen a change in the behavior of cybercriminals, who are now trying to break into the networks through phishing attacks, abusing the trust and insecurity of people seeking information about Covid-19.»”.
According to the POIPolicía (Chilean Police investigations),there, se registrwas a 40% increase in computer crimes in the last four weeks, and of that percentage highlights that 90% has to do with ‘phishing’, taking advantage of massive access to social networks and the increase of telework in confinement. Also over the last few days have seen various messages sent by WhatsApp with links, emails and even text messages with alleged requests to subsidies, government bonds, registrations to reductions of financial credits, among others.
Ordigital growth force andn education in Chile
In the first few days the impact on families on their accustomed lifestyles could be quickly seen, especially in schoolss and students, it was a drastic change because they were not prepared with digital education programs, and less prepared were teachers, who timidly began to try virtual classes,unfortunately not for all, since approximately 40% of Chilean schoolchildren were able to receive digital distance education in pandemic according to study of Mineduc (Chilean Ministry of Education).
Interesante was to see the speed of adaptation of the little ones in the house, in my case, our daughters did not know that it was Teams or a virtual class about four months ago, and now they are already handled better than me,, as if it had always been a digital distance education, I also find it fantastic that proxy meetings are virtual. This rapid acceptance of generation Z children (in my case) not only accept Teams or Zoom i quickly,but also began to use much more than they have available technologically such as las social networks, games, chats and others to kill time,por what we should constantly accompany them to avoid all kinds of threats in the cyberworld with which they interacted more and more.
According to statistics from Safe and Secure Online and Unesco, 90% of children between the ages of 8 and 14 have access to the internet via mobile, and 49% of these do so after 23:00 onweekdays. Unfortunately not all the apps or games that we install on our mobiles are safe for our children and we must amake sure among other things the permissions that theapplication uses,as many times they are more than they require for their use,for example, location, camera, microphone and others.
On the other hand, According to the survey in linea.cl, 18% of Chilean children spend at least three hours a day playing online and 63% of the people they play with are unknown, so we must be very attentive to the increasein grooming that by fomeno of the pandemic has been more recently and is given when adults make them believe that they are the same age, and generate a bond of trust, then to carry out a sexual abuse. As of June 2020, IDI already has 29 complaints.
Also in pandemic we can see that people about exposing their lives and those of their children. The exhibitionof children on social networks is to open the door to new threats,, since they do not understand some parents that what they share on the network will always be there and can be multicopyed or disseminated without their control.
Some practical and simple tips for parents
*Talk to children at home to maintain a critical attitude online and to be immediately informed if they try to communicate with unknown people in the virtual world even if they pose as minors.
*Not about exposing our children on social media, this creates a window into new threats from cybercriminals
*Keep computers and mobile devices up-to-date with robust security solutions: antiphishing, antimalware, antivirus.
*Checkyour Home Wifi password, worry about putting a sturdy key, an open wifi is equivalent to leaving the door open of your home.
*Do not connect to Wifis publishes«everything free is dangerous», «when not there payment is because the payment is you or your data».
*Do not click on any type of link crowded by email or social networks, it is always recommended to type directly the address in the browser.
*Ideally use payments or process that contain more than one authentication factor or at more than one validation stage such as mail, sms password, and other
*Do not use personal data or repeat the username in the password. It is also advisable to combine letters,symbols, capital letters and numbersos
Conclusion
In Chile despite being the first country in Latin America with access to theInternet, presenting a high development of networks to be service, with massive access of people to mobile phones and having advances in cybersecurity, according to the OAS maturity study (July 2020), we are still halfway there and must continue to democratize and massify cybersecurity knowledge, developing prevention culture in universities, colleges, teachers and especially in more vulnerable sectors of society,where less than 40% were able to access virtual classes in pandemics..
Likewise, in education the digital divide seems not only because of access to Internet resources, but also because of the lack of preparation in digital educational plans and programs in schools,universities and professors, since I take them by surprise, as well as to the whole of society, without having the developed skills or the necessary tools. I think the change is complex and difficult, but at the time it is adopted it no longer has back and post the pandemic backto normal classes, it will ben much more digital than before.
It would be a tremendous competitive advantage for the country, including in early stages of training the Digitization and prevention of Cybersecurity risks,as well as in the university careers of all its curricular meshes..
On the other hand, the development of a culture of prevention in cybersecurity means that minimal controls are applied to families to safely navigate the perfect digital storm. Protectthendchildren ando principalmente a los niños teenagers,who today discover the virtual world from the window of their mobilephone.
It is of no use to be the first country to use social networks, if we do not caution the information we disclose on them or take precautions not to be victims of a scam or cyberattack, where they use as a vector the social engineering of data that we add ourselves on thenetworks.
«The information we expose on social media, we know when we upload, but we do not know where it ends and when they will be deletedor disclosed for other purposes.».
Julio Francisco Naranjo Figueroa
Ingeniero Industrial
Ingeniero Civil Informático
Magíster en Ciberseguridad Universidad de Barcelona
https://www.linkedin.com/in/julio-naranjo-852b4457/
Bibliography and references:
Lack of Cybersecurity Professionals: (ISC)² Global shortfall of cybersecurity workers to reach 1.8 million in five years, new research reveals
research reveals https://www.isc2.org/News-and-Events/Press-Room/Posts/2017/02/14/Global-shortfall-of-cybersecurity-workers-to-reach-1-point-8-million-in-five-years
Cisco System Study on Cybersecurity Professional Gap https://www.latercera.com/que-pasa/noticia/capital-humano-ciberseguridad-desafio-pais/518620/#:~:text=En%20el%20caso%20de%20Chile,encuentra%20el%20%C3%A1rea%20de%20Ciberseguridad. https://seguridaddigital.emol.com/noticias/en-chile-hay-escasez-de-capital-humano-en-ciberseguridad/
OAS Cybersecurity Report 29/07/2020 : Risks, advances and the path in Latin America and the Caribbean https://publications.iadb.org/publications/spanish/document/Reporte-Ciberseguridad-2020-riesgos-avances-y-el-camino-a-seguir-en-America-Latina-y-el-Caribe.pdf
Digital gap and online education: the pandemic is not the same for everyone https://www.emol.com/noticias/Nacional/2020/08/27/996249/27-alumnos-vulnerables-clases-remotas.html
Exposure of children in pandemic http://enlalinea.cl/el-18-de-los-ninos-chilenos-pasa-al-menos-tres-horas-diarias-jugando-en-linea/
Password managers https://www.xatakandroid.com/seguridad/los-mejores-gestores-de-contrasenas-para-android-comparativa-a-fondo
Increased cyberattacks https://www.csirt.gob.cl/media/2020/06/14IMT20-00023-01.pdf https://www.fortinetthreatinsiderlat.com/es/Q1-2020/CL/html/trends
