A walk on the moon is almost a walk in the park compared to combatting today's cyber criminals. The reason? Humans. Within the entire IT industry, cyber security is the single component where there is a human adversary committing the crime on the other end. Operating systems, applications, and network stack have a finite functionality, but cyber crime has the unpredictable element of the human mind behind it. And as it evolves, the onus is on us as a security industry to keep pace.
That's a challenge, for sure. Mankind has been around for thousands of years and we haven't stopped what I call analog crime - a simple bank robbery, for instance, where the thief physically goes into a bank to do the deed. Now we've moved into a digital world where thieves can sit in their pajamas, go online anonymously, and steal what they want from thousands of miles away-all with little risk of repercussions.

Strong Connections
The world's supply chain is increasingly interconnected. While that's great from an efficiency standpoint, it has different implications when it comes to cyber security. If you connect a new device on the Internet, within ten minutes it is compromised. That kind of access puts a whole different spin on how we do business, and puts pressure on organizations to ramp up their security measures. The security of an ecosystem is as good as the security of the weakest link.
And that's a struggle for many organizations. Take a 2,000-person manufacturing company. They're likely not sophisticated, security-wise. Even if they find the funds to pay for the technology, it's a challenge for them to hire the staff to manage it. Outsourcing is an ideal solution - it gives them the technology, experience and intelligence to keep pace with criminals.
But larger companies are at risk, too. As we've seen so often in the past couple of years, credit card breaches and sensitive information can be accessed in even the biggest retailers and some of the world's top governments. It's not like these organizations haven't spent money on security - they're just not looking for the kinds of attacks that are being launched. And therein lies the difficulty.

One Size Doesn't Fit All
The kinds of attacks we see are varied, which makes preventing breaches that much more challenging. It's tough to defend against an attacker you can't see, and whose motivation can be so wildly unpredictable.