Y2K Offers a Template To Squash the Cyber Bug

https://www.afcea.org/content/?q=node/17477/

I found this article interesting because it gives some insight into how we, as a society, can deal with the modern cyber climate/ransomware, by learning from what we did with the last major hurdle to hit the IT space: Y2K. Looking back, many say that Y2K was a “non-event” that was over-hyped. The reality is that it was a non-event, because of the massive efforts that organizations put in, to fix the problem before it happened.

“Several themes common with Y2K play out today. CIOs and CISOs need to know what applications and devices they actually have—it is time for asset discovery and documentation. It is also time to move away from an “if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it” mentality that keeps outdated equipment and software, increasing cyber risk. While Y2K was the single biggest driver for adopting packaged, off-the-shelf software, today cyber concerns are moving data to the cloud. And as with Y2K, cybersecurity has stirred up fears, becoming a board room discussion. Among C-suite executives, it has generated a lot of review and exercise of business contingency plans.

In some ways, it seems as if we are back at the same starting point as with Y2K: having to convince the powers that be that we have a continuing and growing problem amid actions that are not congruent with a holistic national or global framework to achieve the required objective. The cyber bug appears to be larger than life because we neither approach it in a synergistic way, nor are U.S. and international laws in place to address underlying causes. Lawmakers cannot even agree on common security standards for the IoT.”