What's Next for Cybersecurity in 2019?

The impact of cybercrime is increasing, so now more than ever, organizations are investing in cybersecurity. GreyCastle Security is a cybersecurity service provider dedicated to cybersecurity and the practical management of cybersecurity risks. In a webinar led by Reg Harnish, CEO of GreyCastle Security, he spoke about how his cybersecurity predictions for this past year panned out and provided insights on the cybersecurity trends to watch out for in 2019. Whether it is advances in blockchain technology or the death of passwords, here are five trends projected by Harnish and GreyCastle.

The Skill Gap Will Get Wider

The demand for cybersecurity talent is increasing dramatically. And while that may be the case, getting cybersecurity professionals to be elite and where they should be is a time-consuming process because much of the expertise comes with experience. Younger generations are not even interested in cybersecurity, with only 9 percent of millennials wanting a career in the field. While the demand is increasing, the supply is either flat or decreasing. This problem will keep getting worse until we figure out a way to get people interested in cybersecurity and change how long it takes to become an expert in the field.

Blockchain Will Find a Home

According to Harnish, people either like blockchain and believe it can solve every problem or think it won’t solve anything. Blockchain solves integrity type issues — centralized or decentralized. For example, imagine a hospital had an electronic health record (EHR) and all of the data were incorrect, and nobody was aware of it. Blockchain can help solve these types of problems. Next year, Harnish thinks that we could see technology and a process that leverages blockchain and its strengths.

>> READ: 3 Blockchain Startups and 1 Big Move to Patient Data Ownership

The Death of Passwords Will Be Greatly Exaggerated

Over the last few years, people have talked about moving away from traditional passwords and using keys, fobs or multi-factor authentication instead. GreyCastle, however, expects passwords to be around for a very long time, and that they will remain the primary authentication method for the next few years. Although there has been progress with other authentication mechanisms, and a key could make things easier for users, passwords have been around for more than half a century, and the company does not see them going away overnight.

Cybersecurity Will (Start to) be Recognized as a Competitive Advantage

The idea of resilience in a business or company coming from a cybersecurity program was not common until recently. Once we recognize that every business is a data business, cybersecurity becomes more important. Today, more businesses are being bounded and supported by data — data are everything to a business. Progressive businesses need to recognize that resilience and protecting and leveraging data can introduce a competitive advantage for them. And the more a business can control someone’s data, the more influence they have. This year, Uber employees generated fake ride requests for Lyft, driving primetime pricing up for their drivers and making more people want to use Uber. These tactics will become more prevalent in businesses in 2019. “The ability to secure, protect and add resilience to your data is going to be something that companies have to figure out and have to figure out in a way that introduces competitive advantage, or they will essentially be at the whim of their competitors,” Harnish said.

We Will Get One Step Closer to Living in “The Matrix”

This may be the most important trend for 2019, according to Harnish. “Living in a data-driven world creates its own problem,” he said. Take another example from Uber. When users open the Uber app, up to 30 percent of what they see is a simulation. The depiction on the screen doesn’t represent reality, it represents supply and demand with ridesharing. Putting too much trust in the internet leaves us susceptible to disinformation. This problem will just continue to grow, as being unable to determine the reality behind data makes it harder to make good decisions around said data. “… The world around us is nothing more than a simulation or depiction of what those data providers want us to experience,” said Harnish.

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