What the human body teaches us about cyber security

People work best when they talk to each other. So do information systems and modern infrastructures. Today, companies, organizations and governments are hyperconnected and rely on a web of information that has been made mobile and flexible by the power of the internet. We depend on the mobility of the data almost as much as on the information itself, together with the ability to share it across geographies and time zones. People and organizations thrive on interconnectedness, flexibility and the internet.

Computer networks have evolved with these needs, becoming more complex and porous. There are multiple ways in and out of the network, enabling users to connect remotely from anywhere in the world and share information quickly with thousands of people at a time. This is all critical to an efficient business environment. The security that defends those networks, however, has not evolved at the same speed. A new approach is required that has adapted to the interconnected world, where security cannot be guaranteed. The landscape is constantly shifting and threats must be dealt with as they occur.

Traditional approach

As we progressively build these high-tech systems, we have tended to view the computer network as a fortress against malicious intruders – if we build a high enough wall and buy a strong enough lock, we will be safe. Now we have realized this traditional approach is no longer sufficient to defend against today’s fast-moving and intelligent attackers. Businesses and their information networks are not like medieval castles; they exist within a complex ecosystem of other networks and users, internal and external, and have multiple ways in. That is their brilliance and their strength.

If networks are compared to the human body, then cyber attacks can be compared to viruses. Our skin does a pretty good job as a protective outer layer but it cannot keep out everything. Viral DNA is clever; it knows how to mutate and evolve to ensure its own survival. But once inside the body, viruses encounter an equally clever immune system, which is constantly learning and can detect threats. Living in a sterile glass box is not an option for a functioning, social human being, and it is not an option for modern businesses either. The body’s self-defence mechanism is one of the great marvels of biology – and also incredibly pragmatic. We should use the human body as an example of how modern systems must adapt to defeat the threat. We know viruses are going to get in. The question is: how do we defeat them when they do?

Uncertain world

The goal of trying to “secure” all information is unrealistic. In order to have a fighting chance, networks, just like bodies, must be defended through understanding and focusing on the parts of the information infrastructure that are in jeopardy at any one time. We need to start implementing a cyber “immune system” that learns from its environment to avoid recurring problems and combat new ones.

As we continue to embrace all the benefits of the internet, we need to move to a more uncertain world that focuses on behaviours within a network to distinguish normal behaviour from abnormal behaviour, both at individual and group level. New technologies, such as the Enterprise Immune System, work on probabilities and experience, rather than hard-and-fast rules and certainties. This model, which provides instant insight on unusual activity within a network, goes beyond just building higher and higher walls around our data, and helps us understand all the unknowable yet “strange” things that are happening beneath the surface of busy organizations.

Adapting to threat landscape

Companies must consider security not as a state of perfection to be achieved and maintained, but as an on-going process of self-evaluation and informed actions, adapting to the threat landscape as it evolves.

The threats that exist today to a company’s reputation, financials and operations must be kept in constant check to stop them spiralling out of control and into the headlines. To do this, it is critical to separate out the threats that we can live with from the ones that have the potential to inflict existential harm. So a real challenge at the heart of our imperative for good cyber security is one of discovery – of knowing, ahead of time, about the threats that you really care about.

If Edward Snowden has shown us one thing, it is that there is no way you can stay safe from attack. A continuous approach to cyber security accepts that ongoing cyber threat is an inevitable part of doing business. The attackers are out there and more often than not, they are also “in there” – in your networks, in your laptops and even in your office buildings. Cyber security has become the primary global priority for governments and corporations across the globe as the faceless global threat intensifies.

However, by embracing new technologies that internalize defensive mechanisms, we can develop an immune system that will fight off the next major virus just as the body does, while interacting fully in modern life.

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Full details on all of the Technology Pioneers 2015 can be found here 

Author: Nicole Eagan is the CEO of Darktrace, a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer.

Image: A robotic tape library used for mass storage of digital data is pictured at the Konrad-Zuse Centre for applied mathematics and computer science (ZIB), in Berlin August 13, 2013. REUTERS/Thomas Peter.