Does your enterprise really perceive its dependencies, and the best way to mitigate the dangers posed by an assault on them?
12 Aug 2025
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4 min. learn
A panel dialogue at DEF CON 33 final week, titled “Adversaries at conflict: Techniques, applied sciences, and classes from trendy battlefields”, provided a number of thought-provoking factors, in addition to a transparent takeaway: whereas digital techniques akin to misinformation and affect campaigns are helpful in trendy battle, they aren’t going to win a conflict. That’s as a result of when bombs begin dropping and the bodily parts of conflict are below method, the misinformation spreading by digital channels turns into much less essential. Understandably, the victims of battle and people displaced have extra pressing priorities: meals, shelter and staying alive.
Turning the dialog as to if a conflict could possibly be gained utilizing cyberattacks and digital disruption, there was additionally settlement among the many panelists that cyberattacks create non permanent harm, whereas a bomb touchdown on one thing is a simpler and lasting methodology of destruction.
The assaults in opposition to important infrastructure in Ukraine probably affirm this: Russia-aligned actors have launched quite a few cyberattacks in opposition to the nation’s energy grid, leading to non permanent disruptions as techniques will be rebuilt and made operational once more in a comparatively brief time frame. In the meantime, a bomb touchdown on an influence facility is prone to trigger long-term harm and limitation of service that might take months or years to revive. The large-picture conclusion on this a part of the panel dialogue is {that a} conflict can’t be gained by cyber alone – it nonetheless must be gained on the bodily battlefield.
Cyber and bodily safety
The dialogue then advanced to how cyber impacts the bodily. One panelist made the remark to the impact that “a military can’t battle in the event that they haven’t been fed”. Put in another way, as a rising variety of civilian contractors are getting used to offer the logistics wanted to function a military, making the assault floor broader than it might seem.
The panel used Taco Bell as a fictional analogy. A hacker might declare they modified the water provide in Taco Bell, however on nearer inspection it might simply be that they’ve tampered with a restaurant’s water cooler, which might not be sufficient to have an effect on its operations.
Nonetheless, a cyberattack on Taco Bell’s provide chain might deliver it to an operational cease. How? By stopping deliveries of produce to the restaurant. This dependency could possibly be much more obscure: an assault on the businesses that provide the meat utilized in Tacos might probably trigger Taco Bell to stop operations as a consequence of an absence of elements for meals. The analogy holds true for the army: with out meals, the troops can’t battle or are, at greatest, restricted.
What this implies for your enterprise
Shifting past the panel dialogue, this raises a important query for companies: do they actually perceive their dependencies to be operationally resilient? Do they perceive the dependency their prospects have on them to make sure the continued operation of their very own companies?
Sticking with the Taco Bell analogy, think about a cyberattack that takes away a key ingredient the enterprise must function; for instance, if the corporate depends on a provider for taco seasoning, then a cyberattack in opposition to the provider might have an effect on Taco Bell’s skill to maintain working. This isn’t mere hypothesis – there are real-world examples of cyberattacks which have prompted the sort of disruption. For instance, the cyber-incident suffered by Change Healthcare, a well being knowledge processing agency, stopped medical providers being offered throughout practices and hospitals.
Right now, so far as I do know, cybercriminals solely extort fee from these they instantly assault. However what if a cybercriminal determined to assault the third celebration after which demand an extortion fee from all the companies that depend on that provider? In my instance, say the taco seasoning firm is disrupted by ransomware, and whereas the cybercriminal could ask the seasoning firm to pay a requirement instantly, they could really achieve extra in the event that they requested fee from all the businesses reliant on the provider’s product, as an absence of provide could value them greater than the provider itself.
Whereas this monetization technique could seem speculative, there is a crucial level right here: does your enterprise really perceive its dependencies and the best way to mitigate the danger of assault on these it’s depending on? An actual-world instance could be an assault on a catering firm that’s contracted to feed sufferers in a hospital. If the flexibility to feed sufferers is disrupted as a consequence of a cyberattack, then the hospital could should declare a significant incident and shut admissions to new sufferers. On this situation, would the hospital pay an extortion demand that brings again catering provide?
The important thing takeaway from this panel session for me is that this: all of us must map and totally perceive the dependencies we depend on and guarantee now we have resilience the place wanted. If we are able to’t get to some extent of resilience, then we at the very least want to grasp the danger posed by the dependencies.
