I'm Chief Regulatory Advisor at Jisc, responsible for keeping an eye out for places where our ideas, services and products might raise regulatory issues. My aim is to fix either the product or service, or the regulation, before there's a painful bump!
Display Names are often how we are represented online. Michael might choose to appear as “MusicFan”, “Mikey”, “Florence” or “Andrew”. Does that establish a good tone for discussion? Or does it risk misleading readers, perhaps making them act on the basis of a mistaken identity? Platforms that use display names can and, I think, should […]
Sophos have recently released a tool that uses Machine Learning to propose simple rules that can be used to identify malware. The output from YaraML has many potential uses, but here I’m considering it as an example of how automation might help end devices identify hostile files in storage (a use-case described by Sophos) and […]
I’m hoping my generic model of a security automat (Levers, Data, Malice, Controls, Signals) will help me think about how tools can contribute to network security and operations. It produces the ideas I’d expect when applied to areas that I already know about, but the acid test is what happens when I use it to […]
A couple of recent discussions have mentioned “trade-offs” between risks. But I wonder whether that might sometimes be a misleading phrase: concealing dangers and perhaps even hiding opportunities? “Trade-off” makes me think of a see-saw – one end down, other up – which has a couple of implications. First, the two ends are in opposition; […]
Earlier in the year, Networkshop included a presentation on Juniper’s Mist AI system for managing wifi networks. I was going to look at it – as an application I don’t know – as a test for my model for thinking about network/security automation. That may still happen, but first it has taken me down an […]
Throughout the time I’ve been working for Janet, the possibility of using technology to block undesirable activity on networks and computers keeps coming up. Here are four questions I use to think about whether and how technology is likely to be effective in reducing a particular kind of activity: Where is the list? Any technology […]
Victoria Baines closed the FIRST conference with a challenge to improve our image (video). Try searching for “cyber security” and you’ll see why: lots of ones, zeroes, padlocks, and faceless figures in hoodies. Some of the latter look a lot like the grim reaper, which makes the task seem hopeless: in fact, cyber badguys can […]
Knowledge Management (KM) isn’t a topic I remember being presented at a FIRST conference before, but Rebecca Taylor (video) made a good case for its relevance. Security and incident response use and produce a lot of information – a Knowledge Management approach could help us use it better. Most teams quickly recognise the benefits of […]
Incident Response Teams are, as the name indicates, responsive. Often they will try to provide whatever services their constituency asks for, or seems to need. However over time that can result in a mismatch between what the team offers and what its resources, capabilities and authority can actually deliver. That leads frustration, both among disappointed […]
Tony Kirtley’s FIRST conference talk (video) explored how the Kubler-Ross model of grieving can help understand the emotional effects of a ransomware attack, both to avoid negative consequences and, where possible, to use natural emotions to support positive responses: Denial: in a ransomware attack, denial should be short-lived, as the nature of the problem will […]