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While media coverage of vulnerabilities in the media can present challenges, the coverage also presents awareness opportunities. Media coverage can provide awareness not only to security professional but also to those within an organization tasked with making security decisions.
Budgeting for computer security can be taxing and the cost can sometimes seem expensive. Vulnerability awareness can help stress the importance of adequate security measures and hopefully lead to wise decisions regarding allocating funds for security. The media can be useful for gathering data.
Sometimes media representatives and their staff may be able to contact individuals or organizations that security professionals may not be able to reach. The media can be used as a tool to widely disseminate the information among people in many different areas of knowledge. Proverbs 15:22 says "The lips of the wise spread knowledge; not so the hearts of fools." One of the challenges comes when the media fails to present accurate information.
It can also be challenging when the media incites unnecessary fear or frenzy. Proverbs 15:14 says "The heart of him who has understanding seeks knowledge, but the mouths of fools feed on folly." It is not unusual for the media to exaggerate or sensationalize vulnerabilities that may not be as dangerous as the media makes it seem. I believe security breaches with never be eradicated. As long as computers exist, there will be security threats. The motivation for breaches may be changing but not decreasing. In the future, attack tools will be able to better learn from its environment in order to avoid detection and more effectively exploit vulnerabilities.
Current laws and regulations are so varied and confusing and provide little recourse for the victims of breaches seeking damages through civil suits. Legislation issued by Congress often focuses heavily on responding to cyber attacks rather than preventing them (Vail, 2017). Ineffective protections for victims of breaches gives companies little incentive to work swiftly to rectify vulnerabilities.
The ambiguousness of the laws makes it difficult for the situations with breaches to get better especially where there is no accountability.
Cybersecurity must be prioritized on the highest level of an organization in order to be effective. Organizations must be willing to invest resources into strong security measures. Plachkinova, M., & Maurer, C. (2018). Security breach at Target. Journal of Information Systems Education, 29(1), 11-19. Vail, H. (2017). Cybersecurity reform in the wake of the OPM breach. Suffolk University Law Review, 50(1), 221.