Acting collectively and sharing experiences is the only way for businesses to beat technical and commercial hackers, says Laurent Sarrat, CEO and Co-Founder, Sis ID.
To fight effectively against highly organised cyber threats, companies should switch into the role of defender rather than victim.
Faced with the explosion of cyber-attacks, they must reverse the balance of power. In just a few years, cybercrime, which was once the preserve of amateurs, is now carried out by efficient international networks. Today, regardless of their size and sector of activity, all companies are exposed to it.
Those engaged in cybercrime tend to fall into two profile types. There are the technical hackers whose objective is to flush out the computer flaws in the billions of lines of code of the infrastructures they want to attack. And then there are the commercial hackers who play on the psychological manipulation of their potential victims to extract valuable information.
These two methods or trends, which used to be separate categories of activity, are now coming together. The aim is to increase efficiency by playing on both sides of the fence. This is an approach that companies must now take into account when deploying defence strategies. It is time for them to use the same techniques as those of the attackers, i.e. to group together to create an ecosystem enabling them to work together.
Playing collectively is probably the best way to deal with cybercrime. Without sharing information about their cyber-attacks, companies will find it difficult to alter the balance of power in their favour.
It is in the interest of companies to share their data on cyber-attacks. It is then up to cyber-defence professionals to apply their technologies and analyse new fraud patterns.
Such a system forces companies to be transparent about the nature of their cyber-attacks, which, fearing for their reputation, they instinctively prefer to keep quiet about. But this silence has become dangerous when one looks at the explosion of cyber-attacks and the impact they have on a company’s image.
Playing collectively is probably the best way to deal with cybercrime. Without sharing information about their cyber-attacks, companies will find it difficult to alter the balance of power in their favour. By choosing to deal with cyber threats on their own, companies will surely lose the battle to ever more innovative hackers.
Laurent Sarrat
CEO and Co-Founder, Sis ID
Laurent Sarrat began his career as a systems engineer at Case Corporation. After posts with companies including Fi System, Atos, and Capgemini, he joined Sanofi in 2008 where he attained the position of Head of Business Information Services.
In 2016 Sarrat co-founded Sis ID, which specialises in combating bank transfer fraud.
