We talk about the impact that cyber attacks have on individuals and small businesses suffer daily but that also succeed in large companies as it happened on Monday in the SER Chain
The SER chain has suffered this morning an attack of computer virus that has affected all its computer systems in general.
Beyond the headline in ‘La Ventana we wanted to know how these things happen, why they happen, who can be behind, how they can be prevented or how they can be fought. That is why we have invited Deepak Daswani, an expert in hacking and cybersecurity and author of the book ‘The threat hacker’.
The SER Chain attack is a ransomware , a virus that “hijacks the session and data of a computer and asks for a ransom in return”; a type of malware that, according to Daswani, has evolved over time since hackers know that “they can obtain a significant economic revenue” from it. And it is that when encrypting the data they ask for a ransom to be able to decrypt it and many companies – the Cadena SER will not do it – end up paying it to recover their files; something that is not even guaranteed.
They also affect individuals
Although in this case the cyberattack is news because it has affected the most listened to radio in the country, the truth is that these types of attacks are common in small businesses and even individuals: “It is not recommended to pay ; because although in many cases it is true that you recover the information, but in others it is possible that not or that when you retrieve the information you will also be injected with a gift to do it again ”.
In figures – as Daswan explains – cybercrime is estimated to have a global economic impact of $ 600 billion; “More than drug trafficking or any traditionally lucrative criminal activity. For many years now cybercrime has been above these types of activities ”.
This cyberattack – like any other – can come from anywhere; although the usual thing, according to Daswani, is that they are professional cybercriminal organizations: “These are bands that are very difficult to locate and identify.” There are also other motivations, such as hacktivists who use the network todemonstrate or who are looking for “information or power”.
Hackers are needed
“It is not necessary to be on the side of evil to be signed by a large multinational,” says Daswani explaining that companies are in a constant search for professionals to strengthen their security; In fact “there are many competitions where hackers can test their skills.”
Jaime García Cantero, director of contents of ‘El País Retina’ has also passed through ‘La Ventana’ and has warned that these types of attacks are going more; Now they are serious but the time will come when “your computer is no longer hacked but your connected car or the door of your house”.
Become aware of a reality
García Cantero warns of the need to prepare for this type of computer attacks that do not exclusively affect companies such as ‘ PRISA Radio ‘ but also individuals: “It is very important to make people aware that we are threatened.” The director of contents of this magazine of ‘El País’ has also pointed out that now the risk is also in mobile phones because “it is where it is easier to access”.
As the sensation that has been this Monday November 4 in the writing of the SER Chain has been that of a great computer blackout, we have invited Ana Alonso, director of ‘The Great Blackout’ to the program who has explained to us how the idea arose to produce a podcast that was based on the premise that due to a solar storm there was light throughout the world.
Paleoanthropologist Juan Luis Arsuaga has also been in this section of the program with whom we have talked about how technology conditions our lives and what happens when we lose it; because considering that “we would not know how to do anything, we would not know how to make fire” it is not viable to return to a pre-technological era.
