Why Cyber Security Is a Socio-Technical Challenge

Book excerpt: This book is a provocative manifesto of disruptive thinking about cyber security. It presents cutting-edge thinking and professional reflection and is designed to be a source of ideas and approaches that can be adopted for application in the real world by those who recognize that conventional ways of defining and considering cyber-attack are insufficient. All of the authors believe that the term cyber must be urgently wrestled back from the technologists, cyber security professionals, consultancies and corporate silos that have hijacked it (seemingly without any resistance) and rendered the term essentially meaningless. The authors write from applied and often unique experiences in a range of commercial, consulting, state and defense environments. Many of the authors of this volume have direct experience of inflicting, reporting on and protecting organizations from such effects, and also have knowledge of taking the challenge to additional levels. Most consultancies, academics and experts dont live in the real world, are content with operating in the commoditised world of cyber-technical security and dont have the intellectual capacity to understand, engage with or monetize this more challenging reality. This book is intended to help organizations improve preparedness for the established cyber world reality.