Kenrick Bagnall

One of the key factors when performing a cybersecurity vulnerability risk assessment is understanding what your environment looks like under normal conditions, both from a personal and corporate security perspective. The basic premise is that with a clear picture of what normal operations looks like, abnormal occurrences become clearer and can be recognized and acted on quickly.

Back in the Sept./Oct. 2016 issue of Canadian Security, I wrote about standing up to cyber bullies. Three years later, cyber bullying continues to evolve as both the number of victims and the ways in which they are victimized increase. As children approach adolescence, they begin to seek validation outside the social circle of their immediate family. The internet and social media have exponentially expanded the landscape of potential social interaction.

As a cybercrime investigator with the Toronto Police Service, I see the importance of having a complete incident response and recovery plan. In the wake of a breach, most organizations are concerned with figuring out how the attacker got in, what damage they did, how to get the attacker out, and how they can prevent it from happening again. From a law enforcement perspective, the goal is attribution.