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CyberSecMonth 2022 Webinar | Prime Crime – Ransomware has grown up, and we should too | 6 October 14:00 CEST

GEANT CyberSecMonth 2022 Webinar - Prime Crime – Ransomware - Orange Cybersecurity

– 14:00 – 15:00 CEST | Speaker: Charl van der Walt (Orange Cyberdefense)

In our presentation at GÉANT Cyber Security Month 2021, we started to tell the story of ransomware – a take of Somali pirates and East European crime lords. We examined the current form and impact of the crime and discovered why the GÉANT community should be seriously concerned about this insidious threat.

In this presentation we continue the story of ransomware with a deeper, more serious examination of the nature of the threat and our efforts to counter it.

There is a commonly held misperception that cyber technology is the dominant factor in cybercrime. It’s not. Crime is the dominant factor in cybercrime. If we want to understand the cybercrime problem, we need to recognise that factors like innovation in crime business models, monetisation and markets by criminals have a significant impact, not just technology.

And to understand cyber extortion as a crime it is useful, indeed even necessary, to leverage the insights offered to us through the well-established discipline of criminology. This offers a perspective on the problem not often considered by security practitioners. Ransomware is fundamentally a crime so it stands to reason that any efforts to counter it should be routed in a theoretical understanding of the fundamental principles of crime.

In this presentation we revisit the insidious problem of ‘ransomware’. We look at the problem as a crime, which we label ‘Cyber Extortion’. We consider what can be learned about the problem, how it fundamentally works, and how we could potentially disrupt it by viewing the problem through the lens of an established criminological model called ‘Routine Activity Theory’.

Attendees can look forward to some fascinating first-hand insights into how this crime works and how the criminals think and operate. By applying formal crime theories, we move beyond the hype toward a formal, structured understanding of the fundamental attributes of the problem. Armed with that understanding, we can progress to discussing how businesses individually and collectively can work to tackle the issue effectively.

Charl van der Walt, Orange Cyberdefense

About the speaker

Charl van der Walt is Head of Security Research for Orange Cyberdefense, where he now leads a specialist security research unit that identifies, tracks, analyses & communicates significant developments in the security landscape that may impact customers. Previously Charl was a co-founder of SensePost – a penetration testing company that has made a mark on the industry globally for two decades now.

Charl and his team are globally recognised and frequently showcased at international security events such as Black Hat, RSA & BSides. Orange’s access to authentic security data as an operator, and their deep focus on intelligence and research, place Charl in a unique position to understand and comment on the fundamental dynamics of the security landscape.

Also this year GÉANT joins the European Cyber Security Month, with the campaign 'A Community of Cyber Heroes'. Read articles from cyber security experts within our community and download resources from our awareness package on connect.geant.org/csm2022
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