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The Danger From Within

Abstract: 
This article is a review of the current problems surrounding cyberattacks on large companies, such as the Target attack, where millions of customer’s data is compromised. The argument made is that a lot of attention is paid to direct, aggressive attacks to these large entities, when really individual employees and small companies that are connected to these companies (usually by providing services to them, such as contractors). As the case with most aspects of cybersecurity, companies are unwilling to invest in solutions because it is hard to estimate the magnitude of the threat. The article goes on to talk about how this problem will rise, due to the fact that companies now rely on many external sources for IT, HR, cleaning, etc., and employees are more frequently doing work on personal devices. The presented solutions mostly promote more awareness of the problem, from the point of interviewing new employees onward. This would fit in well with Week 9: Management and Cybersecurity, because it provides another side to the issue presented with the TJX hack example.
Author: 
David Upton, Sadie Creese
Institution: 
Harvard Business Review
Year: 
2019
Domains-Issue Area: 
Region(s): 
Industry Focus: 
Internet & Cyberspace
Country: 
United States
Datatype(s): 
Case Studies
Policies