Are hackers winning the battle?

If you believe that security geeks out there are working relentlessly to make sure your computer is safe, then perhaps it’s time for a reality check. Security professionals admit that hackers are better armed than them. A recent survey has unearthed some disturbing facts.

It seems that hackers aren’t scared anymore, or they don’t need to be, if the survey is to be believed. The survey, published by RedSeal Systems and Dimensional Research, has raised some serious questions with regard to the efficiency of security professionals in dealing with hackers. Interviews conducted with 1,967 security professionals during the Cisco Live and Black Hat USA conferences have revealed that more than 75 per cent of them believe that hackers can outsmart them with the help of automated tools. They feel that with their expertise, hackers can evade security systems used by most enterprises to safeguard their critical data.

According to the survey, most of the professionals interviewed believe that their employers are not competent enough to provide the level of protection which is necessary, due to their ineptness. The survey has also indicated that IT professionals are unaware of some key facts about their own networks. Some facts and figures that have emerged out of the survey are:
• More than 71% of the professionals interviewed admitted to their networks being vulnerable to external threats owing to improper configuration issues.
• Over 50% of the respondents had no clue as to how many of their employers’ internal hosts were exposed to the Internet.
• Around 52% of them admitted that their vulnerability management initiatives weren’t good enough to prioritize remedies based on real attacks.

Mike Lloyd, chief scientist, RedSeal Systems, said, “On the one hand, it shows that, as an industry, we are growing up- we’re willing to admit we don’t have all the answers,” he says. “On the other hand, it also shows that it’s time for many organizations to wake up and smell the coffee-they don’t have some of the information they need to build a comprehensive defense.”