A Misallocation of Funds?

By Dan Verton

November 26, 2001 12:00 PM ET

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Computerworld - According to Mike Hager, vice president of network security and disaster recovery at Oppenheimer Funds Inc. in New York, corporations are facing a key problem: They have spent about 80% of their security dollars to protect against outside threats when in fact 80% of all attacks come from the inside.
The misdirection of resources has led to misperceptions about cyberthreats among senior executives, said Hager. "If we don't educate senior management about what the real threats are, we don't get support from them," he said. "That's the No. 1 threat."
Hager said he found out firsthand how easy it is for insider access to be abused. During a recent audit of his own enterprise, he managed to crack 800 user passwords in three minutes using a standard tool. Within 36 hours, he was able to crack all 27,000 passwords being used throughout the organization.
The ability to crack weak user passwords is particularly important because the answer to the question "Will a hacker be able to get into the network?" will always be yes, said Hager. He recommended that companies focus on enterprise security using an approach that responds to the following questions: Can attackers get in? Where can they go once they get in? And what damage can the attackers do?
In the short term, companies should work to get senior managers to realize the value of corporate data, said Hager, who was on the 32nd floor of Tower 2 of the World Trade Center when the first tower collapsed after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11. "After having everything in our corporate headquarters totally lost, you [realize] real quick how valuable it is," he said.
Read accompanying story:

Security Experts: Users Are the Weakest Link

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