Recently I've started following the public work of Mikko Hypponen (blog | twitter), the Chief Research Officer of F-Secure. I've known about and kept up with the announcements put out by F-Secure for a long time, but never focused in much on any one individual. That was before Mikko's TED talk:

In this talk he centered on how the threats have evolved on the Internet. Actually he starts back with the very first PC virus and shows off how they were the work of hobbyists and the like and they didn't cause any real harm. However, all that's different now. The world is no longer as safe as it was. He talks about the need to have backup systems and backup plans. And he even demonstrates just such a tool for when the computers are down.

Then there was the following video, where Mikko talks about the 3 main groups of attackers that we face today. They are:

• Organized criminal gangs
• Hacktavists
• Nation states

The better we understand the attacks and the ones who commit them, the better we can defend against them. Folks like Mikko work to do just that. What's more important is that it's not just about technical solutions. That's not enough. We've got to have better mechanisms to bring the folks to justice. For those who may be led into group #2, we need to educate what is acceptable and what is not with respect to protesting and trying to make a difference. If you've not watched these videos, I would ask that you do so and put some thought into the challenges we face going forward. Because ultimately, Internet security belongs to all of us.