On pace with the spread of the pandemic, cyberattacks exploded across industries in 2021. Hackers took advantage of vulnerabilities in remote work and the continued digitization of business processes to siphon millions of dollars. As we move into the new year, we’re seeing new threats on the horizon, as cybercriminals develop more accessible pathways to launch attacks, race to exploit automated technology, and even prey on the humans who use it.
It is a well-documented fact that small businesses are targeted most often by cyberattacks. In fact, according to a recent Senate Judiciary Hearing, three out of four cybersecurity incidents in the US were targeted at small businesses. The Senators also pointed out that malicious actors do not always target companies with deep pockets.
Welcome to this week’s Weekly News roundup. Here we present the latest news and updates in the world of cybersecurity. Farm owners should take note of the warning signs and avoid making the systems too insecure. Many of the farms’ computers were designed for consumer use and did not have business settings.
Modern technology has dramatically impacted the operations of agribusinesses. For many rural businesses and farms, one of the primary challenges of adopting technology is cybersecurity. Even now, for several industries and sectors, the concept of cybersecurity is an afterthought.
Welcome to this week’s Weekly News roundup. Here we present the latest news and updates in the world of cybersecurity. This week we have a special focus on cybersecurity in the agriculture sector and the Thanksgiving holidays.
In our earlier columns, we explained that the agriculture sector has lately become one of the hot favorites for hackers. A more recent example is the attack on a dairy processing company in Green Bay. Malicious actors held their data hostage for $2.5 million, halting their business operations for three days.
The Biden-Harris administration is taking several key actions to strengthen American cybersecurity defenses. The talent shortage in cybersecurity is one of the significant challenges every industry is currently facing. In an attempt to address this challenge, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is planning to hire about 150 mission-critical roles across 2022.
With more and more agriculture companies becoming ransomware attack victims, we can’t stress enough the importance of improving cybersecurity in the agriculture and food industries. Unlike other sectors, cyberattacks on agriculture can have grave consequences. Financial loss is just the least scary or the best possible consequence, with mass-scale food contamination, adulteration, food shortages, and supply-side open inflation topping the list.
This was the week the US government gave CMMC, a much-needed and welcome change. The new program, known as CMMC 2.0, has been launched and is aimed at reducing the regulatory burden for companies that supply to the defense industry by reducing the number of levels in CMMC.
In what can be dubbed as one of the most significant and tactful data breaches of the year, trading platform Robinhood notified that a breach on November 3, had compromised the data of close to 7 million customers to varying degrees. The hackers then demanded an extortion payment.
