TNI Bureau: Use of pen drives has come out as the main threat to cyber security in defense forces. As per reports, the USB device has been responsible for about 70 percent of the security breaches in India.
The authorities have issued fresh cyber security guidelines to all the three forces to protect sensitive military networks from hackers.
Pen Drive that was first introduced by IBM more than a decade ago and now mostly manufactured in China is easy to carry and regarded as one of the best used forms of flexible storage devices. But this plug and play storage device has been now labeled as major threats to cyber security.
However, the same equipment has been banned by the respective government and security & defense forces of different countries since it posed as a sharp medium for data-leak.
Support Independent Journalism? Keep us live.
In India, usage of pen drives has also been banned in Military, for security reasons so as to safeguard its cyber assets and secret information. Few years ago, a Major posted some sensitive data in Andaman and Nicobar Islands which were then found being transferred from his computer, but later the fact came to light. Actually his system had been hacked and spying viruses were transferring information to other computers.
Hence many countries have announced strong disciplinary actions including Court martial for the security personnel in case they are found guilty in this regard.
Kaspersky Lab, one of the fastest growing IT security vendors has issued a warning on a global note, that Pen Drives constitute to 43% of cyber security threat. The report further suggests that despite the ban on their use, 33% of government and armed forces related data is spilled through these storage devices all around the world.
So, in this twenty-first century, when technology plays a major role in all aspects of a country, the security sector of the country may land in big trouble, if proper technology related cautions will not be maintained.