Only You… Can Stop Your Fridge From Taking Down Twitter

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By Matthew Carr

Personally, I don’t fear a nuclear attack.

Despite all the scripted drama and political rhetoric over a terrorist group getting its hands on a nuclear device, the reality is nukes are cost prohibitive, even for the most well-heeled groups.

Remember, Saddam Hussein tried to develop them and failed.

North Korea has dumped billions into successfully producing a nuclear device… and that’s basically at slave labor costs. But it took decades to build, and the country still can’t fit it on a missile.

Sure, I’ll be entertained by a show or movies about a terrorist organization trying to steal a nuke or buy one… But the immense costs of attaining one make it less likely of a reality.

A cyberattack though… that’s much more reasonably priced – and getting cheaper by the day. In this article, we’ll examine what that means for you and look at some steps you can take to protect yourself… and potentially profit from the threat.
Even Toasters and Teddy Bears Aren’t Safe
I’ve stated one of my top investment trends for this year is the “Internet of Things” (IoT) and artificial intelligence.

These disruptive trends are changing the world – for better or for worse. And they’ll impact every single one of our lives. In fact, they already have.

They’ll also continue to provide investors opportunities to score big gains.

There are already more than 6 billion devices – excluding smartphones, computers or tablets – connected to the internet. These “smart” things include refrigerators, televisions, security cameras, toothbrushes, toys, etc.

By 2020, the number of devices connected to the internet is expected to swell to more than 20 billion, according to the consulting firm Gartner.

These things are designed to make our lives easier – for example, a refrigerator that knows you’re out of milk or eggs and is programmed to order more from an online grocer.

But of course, there’s a problem with all of this…

The more devices connected to the internet, the more opportunities there are for hackers to break in. Not matter how much you trust it, your fridge will give up your Gmail account password – and possibly more.

That means there is a greater need for cybersecurity.

Just think about how much disruption was caused by the outage at Amazon’s (Nasdaq: AMZN) Web Services unit last week, which shut down the cloud computing platform that powers sites like Netflix, Tinder, Airbnb and Reddit for several hours.

And that incident was the result of a “fat finger” human error, not a cyberattack – where the trends are really troubling. According to DMR, a digital marketing resource…

Last year, 51% of U.S. adults suffered some sort of security incident. And globally, the number of data security breaches rose 40%.
From 2013 to 2015, the cost of cybercrime quadrupled. And it’s expected to quadruple from 2015 to 2019, and reach $2.1 trillion.

In just one attack last October, 1.5 million connected cameras and DVRs were used to take down the website of a cybersecurity journalist.

That same month, sites like Twitter (NYSE: TWTR), Amazon, Spotify and Airbnb were taken down by a …read more

Source:: Investment You

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