Data is everywhere. It seems like new sources of data are being generated every second, and there is no end in sight. Recent analysis indicates, on average, there are at least 2.5 quintillion (18 zeros) bytes of data produced every day. That is an enormous amount of data by anyone's standard.
Nearly 95 percent of all that data is stored digitally. For cyber-focused military units, that's a target-rich environment for data thieves. A fair percentage of that data is likely to be generated by the tens of billions of devices that will be in use by 2020 as part of the internet of things. Yes, those are the same devices that were discussed in this blog earlier, and as you may recall, many of those IoT devices do not have firewalls or antivirus protection, nor are they encrypted.
Now there is a movement toward an intelligent internet of things (IIoT). IIoT leverages machine learning and artificial intelligence to better understand the environment in which its devices are placed and how best to interact with that environment, taking into consideration whether the environment includes human interaction.
In general, the growth of data and data at rest does not stop there! To round out the picture, you must include "data twin." If you have not heard of data twin, you are not alone. Data twin is where metadata, state, event data and analytics intersect. Basically, it is a software model that mimics the physical world in an effort to understand its current state, and it changes in real time. All of this increases the value of the massive amount of data collected, and in an increasing number of cases it is beginning to feed the results to virtual and augmented reality systems. That should provide a glimpse into all the data that needs to be protected in the next few years. A huge challenge to say the least.
In 2016, CyberCoders estimated the digital universe will reach 40 zettabytes by 2020. Stop and consider all the bandwidth needed to transmit that data to a storage device. Think about all the digital data storage that is required and all the backup capacity that is needed for a minimum level of resilience. Think of all the rack space that is needed to support all the servers for generating, processing and storage.
Now consider all the resources needed for data analysis, management and mining. Multiple authorities have expressed concerns about the substantial shortage of data analysis talent. Value cannot be extracted for all that data if we can’t put it to use.
Early this summer, International Data Corp. projected a 50 percent increase in the sale of big data and business analytics software, hardware and services from now until 2020. That equates to a $200-plus billion market in 2020.
The projected data growth is substantial. One recent survey found that data is increasing in value. Not only that, but about 90 percent of respondents said access to data is critical to being competitive. Given those constructs, recent concerns about the increase in cyber espionage is certainly well-founded.
With all of this, it is easy to see why many cybersecurity professionals are calling this a target-rich environment. Given that as a backdrop, a couple of questions immediately come to mind. The first is perhaps the most concerning: Will the theft of data remain the primary objective of these cyberattacks? Perhaps another objective will become dominant. Could cyberattackers, break in and change the data that is used by businesses, government and the military for daily operations? Stop for a moment and consider the ramifications of such an attack.
The information we have and use on a regular basis is perhaps the greatest asset this nation has. We are operating in a target-rich environment for data thieves, and we must rapidly develop an appropriate response. After all, securing our data means protecting our future.
