Tuesday, September 12, 2000

``Netspionage'' is the real security threat on the Net Teenage hackers who deface government sites or steal credit-card numbers attract a lot of attention, but experts say the real problem of cybercrime is corporate-sponsored proprietary information theft committed by professionals who rarely get caught. According to the American Society for Industrial Security, Fortune 1000 companies sustained losses of more than $45 billion last year from thefts of proprietary information, and a survey by the Computer Security Institute indicates over half of 600 companies polled said they suspected their competitors were a likely source of cyberattack. "Your competitors no longer have to be across town, or even across the country; they're in other countries that have different laws and business ethics," says Richard Power, who conducts the annual CSI survey. "Culpability is much less. There is a lawless frontier in terms of theft of trade secrets." Experts agree that while juvenile hackers often leave calling cards enabling them to be traced, professional information thieves are almost impossible to catch. What's even more frustrating is that many firms never know their systems have been breached. "It's difficult for people to see the theft of information," says the owner of a security firm. "Information is the only asset that can be copied or stolen but nothing can appear to be missing. You can still have the information... but have lost the value of that information." (MSNBC, 11 Sep 2000 http://www.msnbc.com/news/457161.asp; NewsScan Daily, 12 September 2000) ["NewsScan" via risks-digest Volume 21, Issue 05] 0:00 # G!