Cyber Vulnerability 3-Part Blog Series: Hikvision’s Senior Director of Cybersecurity On Vulnerabilities, Automatic Software Updates, and Your Home Network
We recently posted a three-part blog series on cyber vulnerabilities, with insights from Hikvision’s senior director of cybersecurity, Chuck Davis. These blogs overview what vulnerabilities are, how they affect our everyday lives, and tips to protect your home router from vulnerabilities.
From the third article in the blog series: “Most people don’t hear about vulnerabilities on a daily basis but when a story about a vulnerability in software hits the news, the public outcry is often to stop using that software. In many cases, this is an overreaction. Vulnerabilities are a part of all of our lives whether we know it or not. We are all using unpatched, vulnerable computers. It’s just not part of our daily concerns, and it shouldn’t be. However, we need to be aware that vulnerabilities exist in all computers and take defensive action.”
Continue reading to learn more about this important topic, and you will find links to each of the three blogs in the vulnerability series.
- “Part 1, Hikvision Senior Director of Cybersecurity on Vulnerabilities: What are Cyber Vulnerabilities?” In this blog, Hikvision’s Davis defined that a vulnerability is a weakness in software that, when exploited, can give an attacker the means to do something malicious or unauthorized. You should care about vulnerabilities because of your smart devices and home computers. Apple, Microsoft and Google create software updates every month for those devices automatically, so you don’t need to think about it. However, not all software systems provide automatic updates. Read the article at this link to learn more.
- “Part 2, Hikvision Senior Director of Cybersecurity on Protecting Your Home Network from Vulnerabilities.” In part two of the series, Davis outlined home network basics. The epicenter of your home network is your router—the device that connects to the Internet—and protects your home devices from regular attacks. Home routers contain a lot of functionality, including a firewall and various servers, but don’t always receive automatic updates. Read part two in the blog series here to learn more. For a list of tips to improve home router security, read this article: “Hikvision Senior Director of Cybersecurity on Security Concerns with Home Router Vulnerability, 3 Tips to Improve Home Router Security.”
- “Part 3, Hikvision Senior Director of Cybersecurity on How Cyber Vulnerabilities Impact Our Everyday Lives.” Davis installed a consumer-grade intrusion prevention system (IPS) outside of his home firewall to not only block malicious attacks, but also to get reporting details on them. In the article, you can see his consumer-grade home network was attacked 3,552 times. “The good news is that your router is great at stopping these attacks. The bad news is that if your router has a known, unpatched vulnerability, attackers will eventually find and attack your router which could give them access to your home network,” Davis added. Read the entire blog at this link.
For more on cybersecurity from Hikvision, click here.