We live in a world where cyber attacks on organisations and government agencies are almost weekly occurrences.
These attacks, often due to heightened tensions between Russia, China, North Korea and the West not only cause issues for businesses, but also debilitate critical services and infrastructure. It’s only been a month since the attack on Synnovis, which saw essential services at St Thomas’s and King’s College Hospitals NHS Trusts being affected – the financial and human costs of which are still not fully understood.
Striking whilst the iron's hot
Due to the world we now find ourselves in, it’s not surprising that the King’s speech on 17th July 2024 set out the government’s plans for cyber and digital data security. Inherited from when the UK was part of the EU, the Network and Information Systems regulations (NIS) does exist; however the UK has fallen behind the EU, following updates made to the legislation since Brexit. This has resulted in calls across the technology sector for the UK to keep pace with the EU and other nations to protect against vulnerabilities. The Cyber Security and Resilience Bill announced as part of the King’s speech is key to strengthening the UK’s cyber defences, encouraging us to step up our cyber security tools and knowledge to protect digital services and critical infrastructure.
The Dracoeye cyber security tool
As a cyber security company, th4ts3cur1ty.company has seen increases across our client base of bad actors, in line with those commonplace in mainstream media. Last year we embarked on two projects to bring products to market to help identify threats in the Cyber Security space. The first of these cyber security tools is Dracoeye – which launched in beta earlier this year – with another project in active development. These projects are a direct response to the increases in cyber security incidents that both us and the media have observed, while streamlining analysts’ workloads.
Currently in beta and launching fully in August 2024, Dracoeye allows users to provide a file, a file hash, a URL, a domain, IP address or email address. From there we check against IOC (indicators of compromise) databases from the likes of Virus Total, AlienVault and Threat Fox, compiling the results in one convenient place. Think of it as an aggregated threat search engine. Since launching in beta, we’ve noticed that while it’s used within the Cyber Security community, it’s now gaining traction beyond our target audience.
As we develop Dracoeye, we aim to broaden its appeal and educate users outside of our community on basic cyber security hygiene. But our industry needs to do more and new tools like Dracoeye aren’t a shot-in-the-arm alone.
The importance of education
Earlier this month, th4ts3cur1ty.company ran an in-person and remote event in partnership with BCS, (The Chartered Institute for IT), designed to provide IT managers with a number of cyber security best practices which they can implement into their workstreams.
As a cyber security company, it’s often difficult to expand our reach beyond the cyber community, which is why partnering with BCS was crucial in expanding our reach. Luckily, collaboration is a culture within our community so we hope to continue with similar events in the future and hope to lead by example to see other companies follow suit. But this essential education needs to be accessible; a balance I feel we do get right by listening to feedback.
As a newcomer to the cyber security industry, the sheer amount of abbreviations and technology has been quite intimidating, so communicating educational workshops in terms that the audience understands is paramount.
In conclusion
The only way we’re going to combat the rise in cyber security incidents is through robust cyber security tools, services and education. The announcement of the Cyber Security and Resilience Bill affirms that the stakes couldn’t be higher and as a country, now is the time to act. We encourage business across the industry and the wider community to collaborate, educate and innovate.
Become part of the solution; learn more about Dracoeye or get in touch with us using our contact form >
