I woke up this morning thinking about the IT industry and its shift from building infrastructure to an industry where everybody is tasked with security, a necessary evil that sucks the life out of companies that could be using their resources for revenue-generating projects. Every new grad I meet is getting their 1st job at one of many companies that provide various security services. From bank fraud investigation, white-night hacking, to security auditing, there must be 10’s if not 100’s of billions dollars being spent on these endeavors. Talk about a tax burden on society! The amount of money being spent on security and equipment is the real extortion, and there is no end in site.
The good news is , I have a few ideas that might help slow down this plague.
Immerse Your Real Data in Fake Data
Ever hear of the bank that keeps an exploding dye bag that they give to people who rob them? Why not apply the same concept to data. Create large fictitious databases and embed them within your real data. Obviously you will need a way internally to ignore the fake data and separate it from real data. Assume for a minute that this issue is easily differentiated by your internal systems. The fictitious financial data could then be traced when unscrupulous hacks try to use it. Worst case, it would create a waste of time for them.
Assuming the stolen data is sold on the dark web, their dark web customers are not going to be happy when they find out the data does not yield any nefarious benefits. The best case is this would also leave a trail for the good guys to figure out who stole the data just by monitoring these fictitious accounts. For example, John James Macintosh, Age 27, of Colby, Kansas does not exist, but his bank account does, and if somebody tried to access it you would instantly know to set a trap of some kind to locate the person accessing the account (if possible).
The same techniques are used in counter intelligence to root out traitors and spies. Carefully planted fake information is dispersed as classified, and by careful forensics security agencies can find the leaker (spy).
Keep the Scammers on the Phone
For spam and phone scams you can also put an end to those, with perhaps a few AI agents working on your behalf. Train these AI entities to respond to all spam and phone scams like an actual human. Have them respond to every obnoxious spam email, and engage any phone scammer with the appropriate responses to keep them on the phone.
These scams only persist because there are just enough little old ladies and just enough people who wishfully open spyware etc. The phone scammers that call me operate in a world where only their actual target people press “1” to hear about their auto warranty options. My guess is 99.9 percent of the people who get these calls hang up instantly or don’t pick up at all. This behavior actually is a benefit to the scammer, as it makes their operation more efficient. Think about it, they only want to spend their phone time & energy on potential victims.
There is an old saying in the sales world that a quick “no” from a contact is far better than spending an hour of your time on a dead end sale. But suppose the AI agents picked up every time and strung the scammer out. This would quickly become a very inefficient business for the scammer. Not to mention computing time is very inexpensive and AI technology is becoming standard. If everybody’s computer/iPhone in the world came with an AI application that would respond to all your nefarious emails and phone scams on your behalf, the scammers would give up at some point.
Those are my favorite two ideas security ideas for now. Let me know if you like either of these, or if you have any of your own out-of-the-box security ideas.
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NetEqualizer News Blog 
Out of the Box Ideas for Security
February 19, 2021 — netequalizerI woke up this morning thinking about the IT industry and its shift from building infrastructure to an industry where everybody is tasked with security, a necessary evil that sucks the life out of companies that could be using their resources for revenue-generating projects. Every new grad I meet is getting their 1st job at one of many companies that provide various security services. From bank fraud investigation, white-night hacking, to security auditing, there must be 10’s if not 100’s of billions dollars being spent on these endeavors. Talk about a tax burden on society! The amount of money being spent on security and equipment is the real extortion, and there is no end in site.
The good news is , I have a few ideas that might help slow down this plague.
Immerse Your Real Data in Fake Data
Ever hear of the bank that keeps an exploding dye bag that they give to people who rob them? Why not apply the same concept to data. Create large fictitious databases and embed them within your real data. Obviously you will need a way internally to ignore the fake data and separate it from real data. Assume for a minute that this issue is easily differentiated by your internal systems. The fictitious financial data could then be traced when unscrupulous hacks try to use it. Worst case, it would create a waste of time for them.
Assuming the stolen data is sold on the dark web, their dark web customers are not going to be happy when they find out the data does not yield any nefarious benefits. The best case is this would also leave a trail for the good guys to figure out who stole the data just by monitoring these fictitious accounts. For example, John James Macintosh, Age 27, of Colby, Kansas does not exist, but his bank account does, and if somebody tried to access it you would instantly know to set a trap of some kind to locate the person accessing the account (if possible).
The same techniques are used in counter intelligence to root out traitors and spies. Carefully planted fake information is dispersed as classified, and by careful forensics security agencies can find the leaker (spy).
Keep the Scammers on the Phone
For spam and phone scams you can also put an end to those, with perhaps a few AI agents working on your behalf. Train these AI entities to respond to all spam and phone scams like an actual human. Have them respond to every obnoxious spam email, and engage any phone scammer with the appropriate responses to keep them on the phone.
These scams only persist because there are just enough little old ladies and just enough people who wishfully open spyware etc. The phone scammers that call me operate in a world where only their actual target people press “1” to hear about their auto warranty options. My guess is 99.9 percent of the people who get these calls hang up instantly or don’t pick up at all. This behavior actually is a benefit to the scammer, as it makes their operation more efficient. Think about it, they only want to spend their phone time & energy on potential victims.
There is an old saying in the sales world that a quick “no” from a contact is far better than spending an hour of your time on a dead end sale. But suppose the AI agents picked up every time and strung the scammer out. This would quickly become a very inefficient business for the scammer. Not to mention computing time is very inexpensive and AI technology is becoming standard. If everybody’s computer/iPhone in the world came with an AI application that would respond to all your nefarious emails and phone scams on your behalf, the scammers would give up at some point.
Those are my favorite two ideas security ideas for now. Let me know if you like either of these, or if you have any of your own out-of-the-box security ideas.
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