Answer:
We already see lots of high profile attacks that lead to stealing personal information or break into large organisations to disrupt their business or demand ransom. But there is a much more serious type of attack that could be possible in the future and that is attacks that disrupt Critical National Infrastructure. These are things we rely on for our day to day lives such as the NHS, Broadband, Electricity, Water, Fuel, Roads, etc. The nightmare scenario is a cyber attack that brings a city to stand-still, that could cause mass casualties and loss of vital services. Fortunately we have been developing technologies that could stop such attacks before they become critical but we have to be vigilant and keep innovating to stay ahead of the bad guys.

Answer:
Humans are the weakest link in the security chain. This means most attacks exploit human vulnerabilities to open an email and click on an attachment that infects their machines. More than 90 percent of cyber attacks today start with opening an infected email. So my ask is for you to keep you phones and computers up-to-date with the latest patches, never click on an attachment or a link in an email or on social media unless your are absolutely sure of the source and finally don’t use simple passwords to access your accounts, that is like leaving the key to your house under the door mat! Don’t make it easy for the criminals to get in!

Answer:
Hackers using phishing emails rely on the same tricks to make you respond as old school scam artists - they play on urgency (you need to respond quickly or something bad will happen) and authority (someone in a position of power is telling you to do something) so that the victim doesn’t have time to really think about the email, or are worried that by ignoring it they might get into trouble. Spotting when someone is trying to trigger your behaviour by not giving you much time to think, or using lots of authority to persuade you, should make you stop and check that the email is legitimate.

Answer:
Yes, everyone (even cyber security researchers) is at risk. You’re not likely to be targeted by really high level, professional hackers working for countries, but it’s so cheap and easy to buy off the shelf tools to launch attacks, and to harvest large amounts of small funds from, say, ransomware, that it’s financially viable to attack lots of individuals. But, the good news is that it’s also quite easy to keep safe - especially compared to large companies. Keep your software up to date, have a different password for email than other accounts (or better, use a password manager and lots of different passwords), and back up stuff you want to keep regularly. If two-factor authentication is offered by your email service, use it. Unfortunately, protecting big companies is a more difficult.