JOHANNESBURG - VIVICA Holdings has announced the appointment of seasoned cybersecurity expert Caesar Tonkin to head up its cybersecurity business ARMATA, which provides technology solutions and niche expertise needed to help local businesses better protect themselves...

The protective nature of humans is perhaps rooted in self-preservation and from a personal standpoint, we all take certain measures to protect ourselves from certain dangers or harms in our environments. “Prevention is better than cure” and “Attack is the best form of...

Between PoPIA, global hacks and an abundant use of the term “ransomware”, it seems like Cyber Security is the talk of the town. Let’s face it though, it’s for good reason, as a seemingly endless space of Cyber Crimes has led to numerous Data Breaches, the compromisation of personal information on an international scale and, with the implementation of new privacy laws, a unanimous fear of the worst case scenario.

Given the global disruption that took place last year, it is hardly surprising that malware increased by 358% and ransomware by 435% as compared to 2019. The rapid push to digitalise and embrace work from home solutions meant companies not only had to accelerate data migration projects to the cloud but also remain cognisant of how best to secure employee endpoint devices while keeping the impact on productivity to a minimum.

With the Protection of Personal Information Act (PoPIA) coming into full effect in July 2021, and bringing with it the threat of financial and reputational damages for organisations that are found to be in contravention, businesses need to take a more proactive approach toward cyber security, including ongoing penetration testing, and continuous refinement of policies and procedures around dealing with personal information.

While the growing number of data breaches and cyber attacks on companies shows that organisations are often not adequately equipped to protect themselves against such threats, privacy regulations being rolled out in many countries, such as GDPR in Europe and PoPIA in South Africa, means companies that fall victim will face further negative impact in the form of severe financial penalties.

Unfortunately, we face a grim reality around sexual abuse online against children. The question remains: How can parents identify and address the problem and how do we better navigate internet usage and safety for our children?

With the current spate of Ransomware attacks (most recently on the Irish Health Service Executive), one can’t help but be concerned. The onset of Covid-19 and increase in work from home users has seen the risk of said attacks multiplying ten-fold, as many people can no longer enjoy the protection of company Firewalls and other systems. And, with the Health Care industry as a whole already overwhelmed by the pandemic, a looming cyber threat is altogether more present as hackers try to take advantage of mass hysteria.