People are the weak link when it comes to cybersecurity

Sources: Ipsos/MNP LLP; PwC Canada; Borden Ladner Gervais LLP

As the June 12-15 Ignite conference brings 4,000 cybersecurity professionals to the Vancouver Convention Centre, businesses of every size and sector are grappling with the human side of data theft

Fifty-two per cent of B.C. businesses in a recent Ipsos/MNP LLP survey said that hackers accessed or may have accessed their confidential information in the past year. As the June 12-15 Ignite conference brings 4,000 cybersecurity professionals to the Vancouver Convention Centre to talk the latest in high-tech prevention, businesses of every size and sector are grappling with the human side of data theft.

Konstantin Beznosov, founder of UBC’s Laboratory for Education and Research in Secure Systems Engineering, says that despite advances in security technology, “the last three feet, where the users are” is often where vulnerabilities lie. The challenge is adapting security to the ways that different generations and social groups use technology. “That’s a focus of usable security research right now,” Beznosov says. “We need to make it very easy for both consumers and people who manage systems to improve their security hygiene.”