The education sector is under threat from hackers. Cyberattacks are constant and it is difficult to update defenses to prevent waves of malware launched by cybercriminals with the aim of stealing data, infecting systems and carrying out all kinds of strategies taking advantage of these facilities.
Microsoft already warned a few months ago that doing a 30-day analysis, more than 82% of the malware it had detected was directed at the education sector. In addition, several educational institutions had received more than 1,000 phishing attacks in four months and are twice as likely to receive fraud attempts on business emails than other industries.
What is it that makes education such a juicy target for hackers? Miguel López, general director of Barracuda Networks, explains it: “There are multiple factors, but probably one of the most prominent is the fact of the low levels of investment in cybersecurity measures in relation to the number of users,” he says.
“Let us think that a university has to provide service to hundreds or thousands of employees and professors, but also to thousands or tens of thousands of students and usually IT resources and, especially, investment in cybersecurity does not usually adequately cover the latter” , highlights López, an expert in systems against cyberattacks.
For educational institutions to catch up on cybersecurity, smart investment is necessary: ??“From the point of view of cybersecurity vendors, making the tools affordable. For example, in Barracuda, the licensing of security solutions for universities includes a free license for students”.
However, Miguel López also assures that it is necessary to sensitize all users in the education sector with these dangers “increasing their economic resources and the awareness of teachers, employees and students aimed at promoting a culture of cybersecurity in which the IT resources responsibly and safely”.
Regarding whether something is being done in Spain to improve the cybersecurity of educational centers, López believes that “not enough” and that there are few examples of this: “There are some initiatives in schools and institutes that are very interesting but seek to promote more awareness against cyberbullying and/or the appropriate use of social networks, both of which are very important but partial aspects and do not address the problem of cybersecurity as a whole”, he comments.
“Having the most complete training and awareness elements possible in cybersecurity in all educational centers and at all levels and ages would be an element that would help promote the idea of ??cybersecurity as the fundamental basis of our digital identity and the use we make of the networks and the media”, says the head of Barracuda Networks.
Training in cybersecurity is essential both for teachers and for all types of professionals in the education sector, according to López, who believes that teachers themselves “as well as university employees (including management) and students” should be educated on this topic. .
The Master in Cybersecurity (developed by Deloitte) aims to train you in topics such as cyberintelligence, malware, ethical hacking or monitoring. It is aimed at both recent university graduates in technical areas who want to focus their professional career in the field of computer security, as well as professionals in the sector who need a higher level of specialization.
With the IEP Master’s in Cybersecurity you will learn to establish protection of computer systems, networks and devices against cyber threats, including data theft, espionage, malware, phishing, denial of service attacks, among others .
Nuclio’s Master in Cybersecurity offers a dual vision, on the one hand you will become the most complete cybersecurity technician, where you will learn to look for the most complex security holes as an ethical hacker, to be able to design technological security as a good architect would security or even perform analysis on real data sources as a forensic expert would.
