‘Israelis more cyber savvy than Americans’
TECH TALK
Israeli startup Cybereason recently conducted a research study in the US and Israel about cyber security. Apparently, 94% of Israeli respondents claimed that they are aware of the danger cyber threats pose, whereas only 48.3% of Americans responded positively to the same question. This was despite the fact that a much lower number (3%) of Israeli respondents admitted they had personally been victimized by cyber attackers than American respondents (6.8%). Furthermore, 17% of Israelis claimed that they knew someone who had experienced a cyber attack.
So, what exactly are people afraid of? The biggest fear of Israelis is credit card fraud (33%), which apparently is perceived as less of a threat in the US, since it is feared by only 24.4% of respondents. Americans, on the other hand, are mostly concerned about identity theft (45.8%), while this problem comes in third place among Israeli respondents with only 25% viewing it as a serious threat.
The second most common fear among Israelis was that a virus would attack their computer (29%), and number four on the list is ransomware (10%). In the US, the various concerns are ranked differently, with fear of virus coming in third (17.5%), ransomware fourth (5.2%) and lastly spam (1.9%).
Of Israelis who have personally experienced ransomware attacks, only 7% ended up paying their attackers a ransom (which translates to 0.2% of the overall population), compared with 9.5% of Americans who gave in to ransom threats.
Of Americans who fell victim to ransomware attacks, only 20.3% of them approached others for help. Of the Americans who asked for help, 52.7% approached family members, 20.3% called a computer expert, and 14.9% contacted the local police department. Alternatively, 77% of Israelis who fell victim to ransomware reached out for help: 37% went to computer repair shops, 30% called family members or friends, and interestingly, only 7% contacted their local police department.
When it comes to keeping documents safe and out of the hands of hackers, Americans are most concerned about credit card and identification details (45.9%). Next, they are worried that pictures and videos (27%), medical documents (12.2%), emails (9.5%) and finally music (5.4%) might be stolen.
And which documents are Israelis, on the other hand, most worried about being stolen? 53% of Israeli respondents said that their biggest fear was of having pictures and videos hacked. 17% were worried about medical and financial documents, 10% about emails and 7% about credit card details.
63% of Americans reported that they back up their documents on external hard drives or on the cloud, compared with only 47% of Israelis. The research among Israeli respondents was carried out in September 2016 by MB – Market Research & Consumer Behavior, run by research and strategy consultants Michal Brumer and Miri Dikman for Cybereason. 500 men and women over the age of 18 participated in the study.
1,270 men and women over the age of 14 participated in the US survey, which was carried out in September by SurveyMonkey.
Digital Rights
In response to the approval of the Knesset biometric initiative that would require all citizens to join the national biometric database and would involve taking fingerprints and facial recognition pictures for all identity cards, Zvi Dvir, a leader of the Digital Rights Movement spoke out with reservations.
“The biometric initiative should have been tabled following the trial. The Knesset is trying to provide the MKs with the information needed to make a considered decision with regard for the need for a database. The trial did not bother to seriously examine alternative methods to meet the requirements of the law. They’re trying to pass the law at lightning speed without explaining what the ramifications of it will be and how it will affect Israeli citizens’ privacy and security – and the country’s democracy.
“What does the government plan on doing if their database gets hacked? There’s a clear and present danger to our national security, and the government needs to internalize this fact. Even the commissioner of the Knesset Committee on Biometric Identification stated that there is no need for fingerprints in the database. Knesset members need to stop this before it’s too late.”
In addition, the Digital Rights Movement publicly announced, “The Israel public is voting with its feet. In the last two weeks, more than 1,000 people have joined our appeal to the Supreme Court and NIS 88,000 has been raised to fight the biometric database law. We are calling on everyone who has not yet joined the battle to... help us rescue Israel from this danger before it’s too late.”
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Translated by Hannah Hochner.