We have just achieved a significant milestone with the release of an awareness module covering the fiftieth topic in our ever-growing information security awareness portfolio. Our topic for October is “cybertage”, meaning sabotage in cyberspace. As you might surmise from the stark red awareness poster in the style of 1940’s public safety warnings, cybertage is an age old subject. It even pre-dates IT: propaganda, for instance, involves deliberately using information to manipulate, undermine and - yes - cybertage an enemy. It is of little consequence how propaganda is delivered: leaflets, emails, stone tablets, CNN, wax cylinders, Blogger, Morse code, hilltop beacons, whatever. Message trumps medium. As with security awareness, it’s the content that matters most. Today’s cyberteurs are truly spoilt for choice. They have the potential to attack their targets through the Internet and a variety of media, and as we learned from Stuxnet even air-gaps are an imperfect defense against s...

An unsolicited email from someone I have never heard of that reads  " Hello, I am seeking representation for a wrongful dismissal. Please advice if this is your area of practice and how much it will cost me to retain your firm" may be brief but it smells distinctly like yet another social engineering scam - presumably an attempt at identity theft, advance fee fraud or some such dastardly deed.  The possibility of a lucrative business deal is a classic social engineering lure, while the sense of urgency is sure to follow. We are not a legal firm and we don't represent others in employment disputes, but if we had been, and if we weren't quite as security-aware and alert for scams of this nature, one of us might have fallen for it or something similar. Given the scammers' negligible costs and income from past hits, carving suitable hooks to ensnare vulnerable people in all manner of professions, industries, organizations, cultures, hobbies  etc . only requires a lit...