There is a lot of excitement about the impending Olympic Games in Paris. Every country will be glued to the screen to see the many events that will hopefully lead to a gold medal for their nation. However, the excitement of the Olympics also fuels a different kind of excitement for cybercriminals, especially those looking to make headlines with a sizable identity management access attack on a major event.
While athletes run for the finish line or record time, cybercriminals are gunning for disruption and chaos, and the credit of being behind one of the biggest identity management cybersecurity breaches in modern history.
Like the many athletes and tourists coming to the games have prepared for years, so have the hackers, and they have the identity management and access management vulnerabilities unseen by many at their fingertips waiting to strike.
July in Paris will be the ideal setting for a string of identity and access management attacks from all around the world. The question remains – is cybersecurity up to the challenge?
Huge Potential for IAM Theft
Early estimates indicate that around 15 million international tourists will descend onto Paris over the course of the Olympics. It puts an enormous strain on the local authorities to not only manage health and safety around the events, but also the vast amount of security requirements both physical and digital.
It is expected that there will be attempted identity and access management attacks to disrupt the event and the lives of those in the city to attend it. Aside from the politically motivated hackers, including Russia and China, no doubt making their intentions known during the festivities, hackers will also focus on essential services like water, power, and transport around the city for ransom demands. Each of these targets require the highest level of communication to operate efficiently during such an important event – which makes them a prime target.
It is safe to assume that forward-planning hackers already have their vulnerabilities at play while waiting for the critical moment to attack.
Tourist Targeting
A sizable amount of Paris businesses will have direct association with tourism this year, from restaurants and cafes to hotels and car hire companies. Each business that involves any element of identity and access management, or taking any customer details, should take this month to analyse their critical systems cybersecurity standing.
Due to the huge influx of tourism potential during the Olympics, hackers will no doubt rely on older techniques for fast action to remotely access machines and execute their malicious plans. The Olympic Games period is ideal timing for stronger access and identity management and zero trust infrastructure to be implemented across all access points.
With time ticking down until the Olympic torch is lit, businesses and organisations around Paris should be using what time is left to conduct critical scenario drills of their customer identity and access management setup and procedures in place for if and when it goes down during an attack.
Tourists themselves need to become aware of the latest financial scams that they may be subjected to during the Olympic festivities, including those who pose as charitable donation transfers via mobile technology.
Any and All Events
The Olympics is not the only podium that cyberattackers and scammers want to raise their arms in victory over. The more media heavy and newsworthy events happen around the world, the more malicious threat actors will develop new and complex ways to disrupt them.
A continuous focus of identity and access management events around the country, the threats posed by cybercriminals gaining an advantage over an identity management system in any organisation is a costly error. One that can be avoided by understanding the landscape detailed by guest speakers at identity access management events in the UK this year.
