Cyber threats on a Norse attack map. Christiaan Colen/Flickr. Some rights reserved.What do the election in Mexico, a hospital in California, baby monitors around the world and tinned fruit in Thailand have in common? They were all were involved in the great ‘cybersecurity’ failures of 2016. They also highlight the spectrum of cybersecurity issues that potentially impact us all: Governments, public services, companies, you and I.
The dizzying scale, technical complexity and downright panic accompanying ‘cyberattacks’ and data breaches often overshadow the fact that human rights are at the heart of cybersecurity, and that attacks mostly impact individuals. The personal information of over 93 million voters in Mexico, including home addresses, were openly published on the internet after being taken from a poorly secured government database. Up to 100,000 people are reportedly kidnapped in Mexico each year. A hospital in California had to cancel surgeries and move patients after attackers took down their network with ransomware. Internet connected devices such as baby monitors were reportedly co-opted by malware and utilised as part of a DDOS attack, which brought down popular websites including Twitter and The New York Times.
The cybersecurity debate can undermine human rights and the international obligation on governments to protect them.
