The news spread rapidly around the globe. The International Red Cross fell victim to a cyberattack in which sensitive data of more than half a million people was stolen. What makes it so explosive: the data belongs to people who are particularly in need of protection. The ICRC is known for providing humanitarian aid in conflict regions. It is unclear who is behind the attack, but Prewen knows how to prevent cyberattacks of this kind.
What happened? Worst-case scenario for the ICRC.
In mid-January, the International Committee of the Red Cross reported a suspected cyberattack on its server hosted in Switzerland. 515,000 records of ‘highly vulnerable people’ were stolen. The NZZ (Neue Zürcher Zeitung) warned: ‘Anyone who attacks the ICRC violates the most elementary rules of civilisation, comparable to an assault on an ambulance or shots fired at medics in a war zone’ (translated). The data affected reportedly came from the ICRC's Family Link service, which reunites people who have been separated from their families.
Who is behind it? Many cyberattacks go undetected.
ICRC Director-General Robert Mardini published an appeal to the data thieves not to publish the stolen data, as this would threaten the lives of many people. The fact that the criminals did not come forward in this case does not bode well. The reason lies in the type of cyberattack. In principle, a distinction is made between two types of cybercrime involving data:
Ransomware attacks: the criminals gain access to the servers and encrypt all data. The company can no longer access its data. This is often followed by ransom demands to release the data again.
Data theft / data misuse: here, data is copied, often in such a way that the victims of the attack do not even notice. The intention behind it can be selling the data to the highest bidder, economic espionage or gathering information in political and military conflicts.
In the ICRC case, there are many indications that this is data misuse. It is not uncommon for a state actor to be behind cyberattacks, with an interest in persecuting opposition figures or political forces. It is to be hoped that this scenario does not prove true for the ICRC and that human lives are therefore not endangered.
How can data misuse be prevented? Data-centric security with format-preserving encryption.
Headlines about cyberattacks are noticeably on the rise. The NZZ am Sonntag recently pointed to the latest cyberattacks on SBB (Swiss Federal Railways), the mail-order pharmacy zur Rose and the ICRC. What these cases have in common is that the data misuse could have been avoided relatively easily. Previous data security systems primarily protect the IT infrastructure. But almost all companies now depend on cloud services, which can no longer be protected in the same way. Prewen therefore relies on data-centric security with format-preserving encryption. The data is encrypted in such a way that, in the event of data theft, it is not available in plaintext and therefore no data misuse is possible.
Data-critical companies rely on Prewen: Swisscom and SIX are protected in a data-centric way.
For many companies and even IT specialists, data-centric protection of data is still little known. The technology, already 20 years old, makes it possible to protect data against any misuse – thanks to format-preserving encryption in all types of data, in all existing applications and on all storage media (local or cloud). Two prominent companies with very high data security requirements have chosen Prewen to implement this solution: the leading communications company Swisscom and SIX Group, which connects the financial markets in Switzerland, Spain and the rest of the world.
Why don't all companies with sensitive data rely on data-centric protection?
Robert Carr, CEO of Heartland Payment Systems, expressed his astonishment as follows: ‘Really, I don't understand why everyone in the world hasn't gone to this form of encryption.’ The question can only be answered if we look at how data security has developed. In the past, companies secured their own infrastructure. That worked well until IT infrastructure became distributed and data and applications were made accessible everywhere and used by various service providers and cloud services. Just as there has been this paradigm shift in the use of data, there must also be a change in thinking when it comes to protecting data. At the heart of this is data-centric protection with format-preserving encryption. Only when this change has taken place will the number of reports of successful cyberattacks decline again and fatal data thefts such as in the ICRC example be effectively prevented – without any restriction on the use of the data.
Learn more about data-centric protection or Prewen's data security offering.
Questions on this topic? We look forward to talking with you.
Get in touch