You don’t have to bomb the energy grid or sabotage/hack the cell network to put a nation literally out of business. There is a much easier route: Hack the EV chargers. Country particularly exposed? Norway! Also exposed: EU, UK, US, China, …
security
Digital privacy is a challenge. GDPR and its siblings make it worse. We need a reset. And then some serious effort to understand the problem. Something the GDPR creators never took the time to. Possibly the most expensive – and detrimental – ‘blind-leading-the-blind’ exercise of all time.
Our digital world is software, created and built by software engineers. If the software stops, the world stops. That’s software power. Can they take it down – or abuse it? Of course. It happens all the time … and it’s getting worse.
Is that what you want? Actually, what you want may not matter, you’ll get it anyway. It may come as a surprise, but AI has been predicting the future for a long time – and very successfully. To the extent that we’ve been totally addicted for ages. Oh, we haven’t…
Digital trust hasn’t delivered. In fact, digital trust, blockchains, even Zero Trust – which is a concept, not a product – turned out to be less than trustworthy. The reason? We couldn’t get humans out of the equation. What we got was more complexity, less understanding and centralization instead of the expected democratization – more power…
Can you blame people (or politicians) for choices they make when they have no clue? Of course you can. That’s how they – and all of us – learn. And having no clue is no excuse for bad business decisions. Nevertheless, most managers and leaders get away with it. Again and again. No wonder we’re in trouble…
Computers need software. Software has bugs. There is no such thing as bug-free software. So how can more software – which means more bugs – improve security? It’s scary actually. Think about it: Just about anything we buy and use and are depending on these days have software. Lightbulbs, batteries,…
Most of us always lock the door. It’s the sane thing to do, it’s a reflex. But why is that window still ajar?
The ‘forgetting curve’ is familiar to most of us. Occasionally a blessing, most of the time the opposite – like in the case at hand: Privacy died many years ago, but most of the world forgot. We’re pretending it’s alive if not well, and spend enormous resources trying to change that – to make it well, make it work. Maybe a short trip down memory lane can get us back on track?
You may remember one of the Beatles’ first hits, ‘Can’t buy me love’. There are many reasons why the song lives on. One of them that there is – even these days – a lot if stuff you cannot buy. Like my mother in law observed about her situation at a care facility recently: I need hearts more than hands – and they cannot be bought.