Few people would dispute the threat level from cyberattacks have increased and will continue to increase for the foreseeable future. However, recently discussions have centered around what is accurately called a game-change’ing level event: and that is a death related to a cyberattack.
About three months ago a survey titled, “Holding the Line Against Cyber Threats: Critical Infrastructure Readiness Survey,” shared some eye-popping results results were compiled and released. Theat survey was of 625 information technology executives from France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States. That study resulted in an eye-opening result. It found that 48 percent of those participating in the poll actually think that a cyberattack is likely to take down components of our critical infrastructure and that will lead to potential loss of life. The time horizon for that startling revelation is within the next three years. When thinking about that, you must keep in mind there are a few incidents possibly related to or caused by a cyberattack that have resulted in the loss of life.
This is an increasing concern and an increasing point of discussion. It’s interest has eEven risen to the point where “CSI: Cyber” season 2 episode number 5 is about hackers attacking the information infrastructure impacting a hospital and putting patients’ lives at risk. Remember, In real life, the infrastructure of a hospital in Georgia received a severely disruptive malware back in 2011 (link: http://www.carecloud.com/hospital-turns-away-patients-when-virus-attacks-network/).
There are those that believe there are multiple incidents that resulted in a loss of life were that have occurred where the loss of life was the direct result of a cyberattacks. What would the response be from our government leaders? They would have to weigh the social and economic impact of their acknowledgement that this took place. They would also have to think through how they would handle the public’s outrage and demand for immediate retaliatory action. This is a hugely complex issue and one can only hope that our military, intelligence community and this administration has put forth the effort to consider such an event and how best to respond. EveryVERY critical infrastructure provider and those related organizations related to or providing that support to the nation’s critical infrastructure should also think through this issue that is growing and more likely to occur each and every day. It is truly a game changer!
