Preparing today for tomorrow’s threats.
When companies hear the word “security,” what concepts come to mind
— safety, protection or perhaps comfort? To the average IT administrator,
security conjures up images of locked-down networks and virus-free devices.
An attacker, state-sponsored agent or hactivist, meanwhile, may view security
as a way to demonstrate expertise by infiltrating and bringing down corporate
or government networks for profit, military goals, political gain — or even fun.
We live in a world in which cybercrime is on the rise. A quick scan of the
timeline of major incidents (See Figure 1, Page 9) shows the increasing
frequency and severity of security breaches — a pattern that is likely
to continue for years to come. Few if any organizations are safe from
cybercriminals, to say nothing of national security. In fact, experts even
exposed authentication and encryption vulnerabilities in the U.S. Federal
Aviation Administration’s new state-of-the-art multibillion-dollar air
traffic control system
3. I.1 Outlook
When companies hear the word “security,” what concepts come to mind
— safety, protection or perhaps comfort? To the average IT administrator,
security conjures up images of locked-down networks and virus-free devices.
An attacker, state-sponsored agent or hactivist, meanwhile, may view security
as a way to demonstrate expertise by infiltrating and bringing down corporate
or government networks for profit, military goals, political gain — or even fun.
Page 3
4. We live in a world in which cybercrime is on the rise. A quick scan of the
timeline of major incidents (See Figure 1, Page 9) shows the increasing
frequency and severity of security breaches — a pattern that is likely
to continue for years to come. Few if any organizations are safe from
cybercriminals, to say nothing of national security. In fact, experts even
exposed authentication and encryption vulnerabilities in the U.S. Federal
Aviation Administration’s new state-of-the-art multibillion-dollar air
traffic control system1
.
Page 4
5. I.1 Outlook
Security now, by necessity, must protect all aspects of the enterprise, from
the data center to the desktop and beyond the network edge. Seemingly
commonplace, yet still nascent, innovations such as cloud services and the
bring-your-own-device (BYOD) trend have only accelerated the need for
relevant security at all points in the information lifecycle.
“The Internet of Things is going to allow us to be more connected and very
productive,” says Art Gilliland, senior vice president, Software Enterprise
Security Products, HP. “But it also creates more areas for adversaries to
compromise the environment. Any device can be the attack point or the thing
that is attacking.” Over the next decade, this reality is going to challenge our
IT environments, our consumer lifestyles and the security industry at large.
“We have very intelligent, highly motivated antagonists who are determined
to cause disruption. We don’t think that’s ever going to go away,” says Rebecca
Lawson, director, Worldwide Enterprise Solutions Marketing, HP.
Enterprises need to adopt a different approach to security. The game is no
longer about locking down the network and blocking every threat. To compete
against adversaries who are increasingly sophisticated and well-funded —
and in many cases, unknown — companies have to manage the risk that is
inherent in doing business in a connected world.
Page 5
“Any device can be the attack point or the thing that is attacking,” Gilliland says.
6. In 2020, companies and individuals alike will need to approach security
from a holistic mindset as threats to corporate, government and personal
information increase. Security professionals will find themselves answering
to CEOs and corporate boards as their policies, processes and vulnerabilities
become companywide priorities.
In order to reduce technical debt downstream and decrease unplanned
downtime, intrusions and business disruption, enterprises will need to
embrace a three-step approach to security:
1. Build it in.
2. Make it intelligent.
3. Protect what matters.
“People do not have a good handle on today’s threats. Pretty much every
corporation is suffering breaches, and when they are even aware of what is
happening, they are unwilling to talk about it,” says Martin Sadler, director,
Cloud and Security, HP Labs. “We do not have today’s threats under control,
and we are going to have to work hard to keep it from getting worse.”
Our goal in this chapter is to shed some light on the most likely threats
enterprises will face in 2020 and what they can do now to protect their
information and networks while enabling agility and privacy. The threats are
very real, and they are very damaging. But enterprises can look at them as
catalysts for positive change.
I.1 Outlook Page 6
“We do not have today’s threats
under control, and we are going
to have to work hard to keep it
from getting worse.”
Martin Sadler, director, Cloud and Security, HP Labs
twitter: @hplabs
7. “Every corporation is suffering
breaches, and they are
unwilling to talk about it.”
I.1 Outlook Page 7
Martin Sadler, director, Cloud and Security, HP Labs
9. Page 9I.1 Outlook
Discussion hub
Doyoubelieveenterprisesaregetting
smarter about enterprise security?
“Biometrics is flawed. Identity as
implemented in enterprise applications
doesn’t necessarily align with how identity
works in the real world.”
— James McGovern
“Identity theft will become much harder to pull off
convincingly in this age of connectedness; as soon
as someone starts misusing your identity you’re
bound to be notified some way or another.”
— Horia Slusanschi
11. Page 11I.2
Combine global technology trends with the emergence of organized cybercrime,
add the universal mandate for businesses to make money, and you have an
unwinnable game for the enterprise.
Here are some emerging trends and top concerns:
Connected societies:
Technology is having a greater influence on society, as seen by the Arab Spring
of 2011. And many anticipate that an additional 1 billion people will be online by
2020, with a significant percentage of them from developing countries. “At some
point in the near future we will end up with more people having access to the
Internet than access to clean water,” Sadler notes. “If you equip people to be a
part of this global communications infrastructure when their other needs are not
being met, they will turn to the Internet to get access to what they need.”
As a result, kinetic warfare or cyberterrorism has the potential to be an
effective means for emerging countries to challenge the developed world on
an increasingly level technology playing field. “It is important to think beyond
software and system vulnerabilities and understand the wider backdrop that is
likely to shape online activity,” Sadler says.
Medical device as vulnerability:
Physical security is coming under scrutiny as an increasing number of implanted
electronic devices such as insulin pumps and pacemakers are being exposed
as vulnerable to hacking. Routinely monitored and interconnected with other
devices over wireless networks, they are raising red flags in the security and
medical communities as the newest vulnerability due to a lack of regulation
and industry oversight. Imagine being held for ransom by someone you never
see, who forces you to drain your bank account in exchange for keeping your
pacemaker running. A vulnerability was recently reported that could make just
this type of scenario a reality2
.
The increase in machine-to-machine interactions:
As cities adopt smart grid technologies and buildings become more “intelligent,”
breaches in security of these interconnected systems will have a cascading
effect. Network grids that control traffic lights, railroad crossings and toll
bridges, for instance, could become prime targets for terrorists or hackers
looking to extort money from governments or individuals.
Our desire to be mobile:
Mobile devices, from smartphones and tablets to laptops and ultrabooks, have
become primary sources of communication and information. As a result,
Threats
12. I.2 Threats
web-based applications are proliferating. But how many of them are secure?
“Web applications are becoming the preferred method of attacks because
they often have vulnerabilities that can be exploited,” Lawson says. “Everyone
wants to have a cool web app but they don’t know the potential risks and
liabilities based on how that app interacts with other apps. These days,
security is still, too often, an afterthought.”
The increase of cloud services:
As companies move more of their infrastructure and their data to the cloud,
adversaries will be able to take advantage of the trend. “In theory, the
cloud services model strengthens security because data will be handled by
companies with whole teams that think about nothing but security. But we’re
not there yet,” says Joseph Menn, author of Fatal System Error: The Hunt for
the New Crime Lords Who are Bringing Down the Internet and an investigative
reporter with Reuters specializing in cyber security.
The growing importance of Big Data:
For large organizations, keeping up with both the volume and the velocity of
information is a huge undertaking. Attackers can exploit immense, distributed
Big Data systems, which often have limited security controls, and gain access
to tremendous amounts of information at once.
13. Page 13
Exploiting the weakest link
The majority of corporate security spending traditionally has been focused on
infrastructure security. However, threats exploit the weakest areas, and for
many organizations that weakest area has become the application layer.
“For several decades people have been paying attention to network
infrastructure security but not application security,” says John Diamant,
secure product development strategist and distinguished technologist, HP.
“It’s a house-of-cards situation: Because security is a weakest-link problem
and applications are filled with vulnerabilities, a company can have plenty of
network-based security but still be exposed.”
What’s more, a disparity exists between the amount of money spent on
application security compared to infrastructure and network security, with
only 10 percent of the average enterprise security budget spent on application
security. However, Diamant notes, more than 70 percent of successful attacks
were carried out at the application level3
. “Application security is one threat
that is seriously under-represented. And it’s one that’s not being well enough
addressed,” he says. The lack of spending on securing applications and code
is creating a mountain of technical debt for which network and infrastructure
security alone cannot compensate.
14. I.2 Threats
“Application security is one threat that is seriously underrepresented,” Diamant points out.
The power of nation-states
The motivations behind cyberattacks also have changed. Hackers are getting
paid handsomely for zero-day exploits, as nation-states and organized-crime
rings fund an emerging cybercriminal market. “There’s an active adversary out
there, trying to get around defenses and out-innovate the security controls you
put in place,” Gilliland says. “The wealth of an entire marketplace is funding an
attack against a single entity.”
Meanwhile, the amount of time between when sophisticated attacks using
cutting-edge technology occur and when corporations see that technology
materialize on their own networks is shrinking. What starts off as a bespoke
attack rapidly becomes industrialized because it can be replicated to be used
against any number of available targets.
“The bad guys are using more sophisticated technology and even developing
their own supply chains,” Sadler notes. “If you want to know who the users of
leading-edge technology are, it’s the people attacking our organizations.”
15. Page 15I.2 Threats
“Security is a weakest-link problem and
applications are filled with vulnerabilities,
so a company can have plenty of network-
based security but still be exposed.”
John Diamant, secure product development strategist and distinguished technologist, HP
17. Page 17I.2 Threats
Discussion hub
What threats do you believe will shape
the security landscape in 2020?
“Security threats follow value. Will there
be anything significantly more valuable in
2020 that we don’t already value today?”
— Horia Slușanschi
“Malicious QRcodes: The ability to place a sticker
over a legitimate code with one that takes you to a
malware site is cropping up more and more. This is
an example of convenience overwhelming security.”
”— Charles Bess
19. I.3
To compete against threats, enterprises must look beyond the all-but-
vanished “network perimeter” and focus on securing applications and
data while understanding identity and access for users as they move from
corporate to hostile networks at will. As threats become more ubiquitous,
organized and directed, companies must remain constantly vigilant.
“We have to build better technologies to authenticate and understand who
users are, what users should have access to or not and what data matters
or doesn’t matter — and put controls directly on the information,” Gilliland
explains. “There are components of that technology that exist today, but
it has to become more sophisticated and more accurate.”
Smart systems
To stay ahead of the bad guys, companies will need to rely more on “smart
systems” which should be able to recognize anomalies in a workflow and emit
an alert before proceeding with the new request.
Innovation
20. I.3 Innovation
“By the time people are involved in defending against an attack, it’s too late,”
Sadler says. “We want systems that protect themselves — to have multiple
layers of defense in much the same way the human body defends itself, and to
act autonomously.”
Along with smart systems, current technologies such as virtualization are
helping mitigate some of the opportunities for attack by removing the ability
for direct communication with critical systems. By using a higher level of
abstraction in the way we configure our storage, networking and processing,
we can better guarantee that security is being enforced and preventing
potential attacks.
Application lifecycle and security
Many of the issues surrounding application security can be significantly
reduced if developers take a lifecycle approach to security and develop the
application with the benefit of protecting it from cradle to grave. The idea is
based on the concept of Total Quality Management (TQM), which W. Edwards
Deming introduced in the 1950s. In the United States, TQM made its way into
manufacturing in the 1970s and into IT software quality assurance in the
1980s, a time when software security was far from an issue.
21. Page 21
Today, however, companies are recognizing the need to architect and build
security into applications from the start, which is no trivial task. “It has taken
us a long time to learn the lessons from Deming,” Diamant says.
“By the time people are involved
in defending against an attack,
it’s too late.”
Martin Sadler, director, Cloud and Security, HP Labs
twitter: @hplabs
22. I.3 Innovation Page 22
Source: HP Comprehensive Applications Threat Analysis (CATA), September 2012
Extending security assurance to meet today’s realities
Organizations cannot afford to be reactive in the current threat-filled environment
In post-release
phase
Patching
In testing
phase
Integration and
penetration testing
In development
phase
Code reviews
In requirements
phase
Architecture
and design
Returnoninvestment
Historical evolution in security assurance maturity
ProactiveReactive
23. Page 23Innovation
Discussion hub
How can organizations like those in healthcare
turn the tides against security breaches?
“Security protocols will adjust, seek out and
quarantine perceived threats before the
system is compromised.”
— Albert Vargas
“A triage approach could focus the scarce
resources of security teams on areas that
need attention.”
— Charles Bess
I.3
25. I.4 Risk management
Most enterprises walk a fine line between agility and security. The simplistic
view is that a company can have either one or the other. However, the two are
not mutually exclusive. Gilliland explains that migrating to a security approach
that protects users and their information instead of the infrastructure and its
devices can help enterprises be more agile.
“If you try to control only the infrastructure, it stops you from adopting new
platforms and from moving and sharing information more freely. Once you
can protect the data, you can actually be more flexible,” says Gilliland.
To achieve the right balance, companies must make security part of the
foundation of every technical design process — and understand the business
risks they are taking when they make security decisions.
Technologies that focus on mitigating attacks can help an enterprise reduce
vulnerability. Solutions that use threat research and correlation of security
events and vulnerabilities with contextual data to deliver security intelligence
across IT operations, infrastructure and applications will be even more critical
as hackers look for new ways to make their attacks more targeted and more
destructive. Enterprises need visibility across the entire organization in order
to see where there may be threats.
In the shorter term, Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder of security research
think tank Ponemon Institute, believes a new generation of tools will alleviate
many of the problems caused by simple human laziness. “We get lazy and
don’t change passwords, and as a result tools are ineffective,” he notes.
“I think we will see more solutions that make security invisible to the user and
under-the-system-level technologies. Call it ‘security with convenience’.”
Above all, executives need to adopt a risk-management mindset to security
policy. “You may have stopped the adversary 5,000 times, but that one breach
creates a perception of negligence,” Gilliland warns. He urges enterprises to
create the infrastructure, toolsets, processes and controls to minimize damage
when the inevitable breach occurs.
Page 25
26. Page 26I.4
Art Gilliland, senior vice president, Software Enterprise Security Products, HP
“You may have stopped the adversary
5,000 times, but that one breach
creates a perception of negligence.”
Risk management
28. Page 28I.4 Risk management
Discussion hub
By 2020, will government entities play a
larger role in protecting citizens online?
“The real issue is how much privacy individuals
are willing to give up in order to have more
security and how much trust they have in the
government to behave benevolently.”
— Kevin Light
“The economies of global corporate entities in
many cases will be greater than the GDP of
many countries, and it is this citizenship that
will be earmarked for protection.”
— Manjit
30. I.5
In the last decade, after a number of high-profile network breaches, state and
federal authorities in the United States have enacted stringent legislation to
protect user data, such as the payment-card industry’s Data Security Standard,
healthcare’s Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and
financial services’ Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. Government requirements and
frameworks have raised awareness of security issues, making it a punishable
offense to willingly — and, in some cases, even unwillingly — expose sensitive
personal information. Whether we will be more secure with these new laws in
place is a subject of much debate.
Some argue that government involvement is essential to protecting individual
entities against the military intelligence of nation-states, while others believe
self-regulation with properly aligned incentives will prove more effective. It’s
important to think about who pays for the cost of security today.
“The economic drivers make it challenging,” Diamant explains. “If the decision-
makers aren’t feeling the direct impact of a breach, companies don’t include
the optimal amount of security.”
Gilliland suggests governments have a role to play in protecting consumers,
but companies won’t win by providing the minimum level of security.
“Regulatory requirements set a bar above which everyone must be,” Gilliland
Regulation
31. Page 31I.5 Regulation
explains. “But you’re competing against an adversary that is looking for
weakness. So if you are aspiring to the low bar, you’re in trouble. We need
to create an ROI model that helps executives truly understand what it takes
to be secure.”
Information stewards
Sadler says research is taking the view that security is about stewardship.
“Our first role is to protect the Internet for everybody,” he says. “We will all be
looking after other people’s information. You expect me (as a company) to use
your information but not misuse that information. If we put homes online in
future smart cities, we will want the service providers to use the information
we’ve given them, but for the purposes we expect. The industry is going
through a period of feeling our way through what is acceptable use and
what is not.”
And when we come under attack, Sadler says, we need to share the nature of
that attack in real time with others around us, to better protect everyone. The
security operations center of 2020 will be federated with partners, suppliers,
customers and even competitors. It will not just be looking inwardly at what is
happening on the corporate network.
“It’s about stewardship — our first
role is to protect the Internet
for everybody.”
Martin Sadler, director, Cloud and Security, HP Labs
twitter: @hplabs
33. Page 33I.5 Regulation
Discussion hub
What can be done to ensure government
has a say without stifling innovation?
“Although portrayed as scary in movies, global
monitoring could increase our feeling of
security if we can prevent misuse of that info.”
— Bastiaan van der Water
“Certain governments will also be the
attackers, claiming the intent to protect
us. Who will protect us from governments
going too far?”
— Patrick Demichel
35. Innovation can be a tremendous driver in keeping networks and data secure.
But it will never be enough. To prepare now for the threats of tomorrow,
companies must take a holistic, grassroots approach to security. In order
to embrace the kind of transformation that is required to be resilient and
defensible in 2020, enterprises must start building security into their cultures.
“Companies must reach out to all their stakeholders and make them aware
that damage can happen anywhere in an organization. It needs be a cultural
norm around which employees are educated,” Lawson says. And having a
breach management plan is critical to dealing with the inevitable. “Companies
no longer get a black eye for a breach, they get a black eye for fumbling after
the breach,” she adds.
Who will be responsible for driving this kind of change? “The role of the chief
information security officer is more important than most people realize,” Menn
explains. “This is a battle of ecosystems, and it has to be taken seriously at the
highest levels.”
I.6 Strategies
36. Page 36
Technology a major driver
For many companies, the use of smart technologies already has begun, with
more organizations bringing integrated and context-aware systems into
their infrastructures to help protect their data. “Luckily, smart systems
implementation is not a Big Bang thing where you have to get everything in
place to make it work. It’s more a collection of separate pieces that help a lot,
and the more we have the better we will be,” Sadler says.
Ponemon has high hopes for security in 2020. “We will see more interoperability
across security technology than we have today,” he predicts. “Today there are
literally hundreds of categories of security devices and a lot of them overlap, so
it’s difficult for a company to know what it needs. The industry needs to come
up with fewer categories and more interoperability.”
Also, he believes more people will be educated about security, acquiring more
skill and a higher security intelligence, which alone may mitigate a good number
of security issues.
Menn explains that, in the short term, security companies are going back to the
drawing board and tying security down to the chip level. They also are
37. Page 37
supporting more business rules in their products, which will allow customers
to limit the functionality of an application so that certain features might have
to be turned on or off depending on the user’s circumstances.
Long-term, Menn believes we will need a new Internet for financial
transactions and sensitive information. “I don’t think TCP/IP can be made
secure. The Internet was something in beta that escaped from the lab. It was
never supposed to be used for banking and government secrets.”
By 2020, many hope the evolution of security technologies and safeguards
may finally outpace the threats they have been designed to protect against.
Others are frank and anticipate continuing difficulties stemming the swelling
tide of attacks. But all agree that the key is in starting today.
“I don’t think TCP/IP can be
made secure. The Internet was
something in beta that escaped
from the lab.”
Joseph Menn, author, investigative reporter with Reuters
Twitter: @josephmenn
I.6 Strategies
(Photo credit: Doug Piburn)
38. Page 38I.6 Strategies
Discussion hub
How will technology change the way
enterprises approach security in 2020?
“The rise of social media helps to link humans
into various digital ‘tribes.’ Such groups or
humans will become more resilient to various
forms of electronic attack.”
— Horia Slușanschis
“BYOD will be widely spread and both
applications and corporate data will be
virtually stored in the cloud. Professionals
will carry their offices in their pockets for
use anywhere at any time.”
— Bo Carlsson
39. 1
Steve Henn, “Could the New Air Traffic Control System Be Hacked?,” NPR.org,
August 14, 2012
2
Homeland Security News Wire, “Pacemakers, other implanted devices,
vulnerable to lethal attacks,” November 28, 2012
3
Microsoft, Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 12, 2012, page 40
I.7 Sources
The views set forth in this publication are not necessarily those of Hewlett-Packard Company or its affiliates (HP), but are the collective views of contributors to this publication, some of which have been curated by HP. Because the
content of this publication is future-looking, it, by definition, makes certain presuppositions and assumptions, some or all of which may or may not be realized.