Mr Sprenger, when someone like you works in a company specialising in cyber security, which view do you take on digitalisation? As a company and as specialists, we take an optimistic view of digitalisation. The more digital it all becomes and the more is transferred to the digital world, the more areas there are in which cyber security is required. You are focussed on rendering companies secure and preparing them for cyber-attacks.
I see primarily two basic forms of attacks on companies. On the one hand, there are those scenarios in which data is copied, i. On the other hand, there are attacks concentrating on hindering the operations of systems and infrastructures or paralysing them. The copying of data, as a rule, causes a more long-term and greater level of damage, whilst the paralysing of systems has, in comparison, a short-term impact. In both scenarios, we can in turn differentiate between general and targeted cyber-attacks.
We can protect ourselves against general attacks by establishing a good basic protection. This is more difficult in the case of targeted attacks. Imagine a Trojan infiltrating the workplace of an employee. If the employee now has access to sensitive customer data, these can also be stolen by the Trojan.
So long as the data is on-line in one form or another, it will be difficult to protect data from a well thought-through and targeted attack. One speaks of APT, an advanced persistent threat. As a first step, the attacker or group of attackers inform themselves very well as to the company and identify individuals working in critical positions thus having access to a lot of information. As soon as the individuals are identified, the attackers attempt to find out as much as possible about the social environment of the selected employees.
In the following step, the employees receive an e-mail which is tailored for them personally, ostensibly coming from a friend or acquaintance. As the text of the message is so specifically tailored to the individual, it provokes no suspicion on his part and he also possibly opens the information in the attachment to the e-mail.
