EC-Council’s CISO MAG to host Nigeria Cyber Security Confluence

Nigeria is one among the few countries in the MENA region that is marching ahead in the space of ICT and is set to draw comparisons to its European counterparts with respect to technological innovations. Several initiatives taken by the Government and the Ministry of Communications Technology validates the fact that Nigeria will soon see a larger share of the Global Digital Economy. The rise of Nigerian technology startups reverberates across the world. It is also an established fact that the nation is among the countries that are geared toward closing the technological divide between Africa and Europe.

Cybersecurity Workforce Shortage Continues to Grow

At a time when cyber risks are proliferating at a faster rate than at any time in history, organizations around the globe are struggling to find talented professionals who can help them defend against these risks. In fact, according to the latest Cybersecurity Workforce Study from (ISC)2, the world’s largest nonprofit association dedicated to IT security, there is currently a massive cybersecurity workforce shortage on a global basis. Around the world, there are currently 2.8 million cybersecurity professionals. Unfortunately, it would take a 145% increase in the number of these professionals in order to fill the current estimated need for 4.07 million cybersecurity professionals.

What you may be getting wrong about cybersecurity

When we hear about breaches, we assume that attackers used some never-before-seen, zero-day exploit to breach our defenses. This situation is normally far from the truth. While it is true that nation-states hold onto tastily crafted zero days that they use to infiltrate the most nationally significant targets, those targets are not you. And they’re probably not your organization, either.

At this year’s Virus Bulletin Conference, much like in years past, we were regaled with many tales of attacks against financially important, high-profile targets. But in the end, the bad actors didn’t get in with the scariest ’sploits. They got in with a phishing email, or, as in a case that one presenter from RiskIQ highlighted, they used wide-open permissions within a very popular cloud resource.

The truth is that the soft underbelly of the security industry consists of hackers taking the path of least resistance: quite often this path is paved with misconfigured security software, human error, or other operational security issues. In other words, it’s not super-“l33t” hackers; it’s you.