Richard Craig – EngD Systems Thinking in Cyberdefence

McAfee announced survey results which show a worrying lack of awareness amongst MPs, business leaders and journalists about the extent of the cyber threat facing the London 2012 Olympic Games.

The report states that a recent survey of MPs, business leaders and journalists (narrow pool of participants) show that only two percent think that a cyber attack poses the greatest threat to the 2012 Olympic games. You might think that a terrorist attack or infrastructure failure would top the list, but a ‘lack of interest from the British public’ tops the poll (carried out between 17th June and 12th July 2011).

The findings suggest that there is a continuing failure to grasp the importance of the cyber threat despite the government categorising the possibility of cyber-attack a tier one threat in the National Security Strategy and warnings from the London Organising Committee of the London Games (LOCOG) that attacks are “inevitable”.

Atos Origin, LOCOG’s IT partner, have said that 14 million malware events were recorded per day during the Beijing Olympics, 400 of which had the potential to impact on the games.McAfee’s own research released in August 2011,  has shown that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has already been the subject of cyber-attacks along with the networks of 72 organisations, although this has not been confirmed by the IOC. [see Operation Shady RAT ].

In the first three months of 2011, McAfee identified more than six million examples of malicious software, which far exceeds any records for a similar time period. There has also been a 76% increase on attacks on android phones. At the current rate of growth McAfee expects samples to reach 75 million by the year end.

The survey showed:

• 52% of business leaders, 64% of politicians and 62% of journalists feel it is unlikely that there will be a large scale cyber-attack during London 2012
• 74% of business people, 79% of politicians and 80% of journalists believe that if an attack took place it would not compromise the Games
• 41% of respondents rated transport as the greatest threat to the success of the Games followed by 38% who rated terror attack as the biggest potential threat
• Only 2% considered cyber-attack the largest threat which was less than those who thought lack of interest from the British public posed a greater problem.

However

• 89% of business leaders, 79% of MPs and 83% of journalists felt that the risk of cyber-attack will grow in the future

David Blunkett, former Home Secretary and Chair of the International Cyber Security Protection Alliance (ICSPA) has called for an education campaign targeted at all parts of society. “At a time when cyber attacks on organisations like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are hitting the headlines, it is important that our lawmakers and opinion formers understand the importance of the work being done to protect the London Olympic Games and use it as a springboard for a national campaign of online vigilance,”