Cyber Security 'increases' in Australia - Simon Smith of eVestigator finds why
Announcement posted by eVestigator Cyber Forensic IT & Expert Witness Services 05 Nov 2016
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Simon Smith of eVestigator® has expressed curiosity when almost once a week he picks up the phone to a journalist who wishes to know his view as to a recent DDoS 'cyber-attack' that occurred to a Governmental system or high profile company.
In a public statement Mr. Smith said, "DDoS attacks live and breathe on the internet as part of 'life'. There are robots out there every day looking for open ports or vulnerabilities to exploit to setup various attacks like phishing scams, SMTP SPAM relays, illegal IP spoofing and more". Mr. Smith went on to say, "When I first activated a FTP server I wrote myself I was alarmed to see as soon as I started listening on port 21, there was an unbelievable amount of attempted connections that simply found me. I started to notice a robotic sequence of brute force username/password attempts based on dictionary style attack. It was almost instant".
Mr. Smith went on to explain it is 'the Internet' and there are both hardware and software tools that block this attack (software of which he himself has written commercially). Ironically, the real issue exists in education and misinformation he explained. "People seem to believe that simply because their router is being hit by foreign IP addresses, they are personally being attacked. I have succeeded in many cyber-stalking cases where I have found false positives from clients who have worried over log entries that were simply, random events from foreign countries that should be blocked. In fact, on my corporate server, I choose to block the entire country of China."
The problem Mr. Smith says sits with the education of the public, the police, and the withholding of information from the companies and government that are attacked. "I do not believe the excuse that banks give when they ask a victim of a SCAM to go and report a fraud to the police and that's it. I am right onto their tactics. I am assisting my clients to 'cut the scam' so to speak and organise with lawyers a class action as against the banks for negligence. I intend to give forensic technical evidence in some of these cases that their software and cybersecurity protective mechanisms are simply 'Not Good Enough' to match their contractual guarantee."
Mr. Smith is happy to advocate for the public and say it how it is. "It is black and white liability shifting. I recently wrote an article talking about Yahoo recently telling its customers about exposing millions of account details and waiting 2 years to expose this information. That, to me, is unacceptable. Banks have guarantees against fraud. If a bank tells you to report the crime or that it has been 'referred to their fraud department' - insist on action or call me and I will for you", Mr. Smith stated.
Mr. Smith then turns to the lack of knowledge his customers say the police have when it comes to cybercrime. Currently he is limited to what he can speak of relating to this as there are pending cases in this area, but what he did say was, "My customers tell me that the police are absolutely incapable of understanding cybercrime. ‘They send us to ACORN who are also useless’. About a year later many end up back with me, and when I eventually gain evidence to solve their case, they are still hit with police resistance and incapacity."
Mr. Smith invites the Hon Michael Keenan MP, Federal Minister for Justice, and the Hon Dan Tehan MP, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Cyber Security to contact him to hear further evidence on the issue as the government 'initiatives' are not working. Mr. Smith states, that "the answer to the question 'why is Australia so surprised in the existence of DDoS attacks, and ultimately risks to National Security', lies with the starting point that the Police have an inability to listen to citizens who try every day to report cybercrime and get ignored or redirected to a dead end."
Mr. Smith says, "Australia is backwards in its capacity to deal with cybercrime and has evidence that the FBI Legat Attaché Office in Canberra has no interest in increasing the skills of Australian experts who want to increase this protection. Those who do have the capacity to use these services (being members of the force) choose not to use it, and stay undereducated."
Mr. Smith has countless Qualifications and actual practical experience in Australia and some Qualifications are recognised by the United States Department of Homeland Security. He has provided intelligence which has caught many cyber stalkers, solved online harassment cases as well as high profile online defamation cases. He has uncovered many SCAMS worth millions of dollars and many to the point where the police need to get involved. "It is only at this point where in my position as a Private Investigator and Cyber Forensics Expert where I need to pass control to the police, things seem to stall, or get ignored", Mr. Smith said.
"There is a strong correlation between the Government of Australia being incapable of handling its own cyber affairs and our own police being able to handle the most basic complaint by a citizen".
"Australia needs reform in this area, not pamphlets at a counter", said Mr. Smith.
Mr. Smith from eVestigator® has a free online penetration testing tool on his website to check for open ports to see if your router may be at risk to attack, free to use if you suspect your router may be compromised by a third party. Mr. Smith is an Expert Witness who mainly deals with High Tech crime and civil matters instructed by lawyers in court matters and Acts as an Independent Expert Witness in any jurisdiction, giving opinions, expert evidence and expert reports and testimony as well as performing Investigations.