Todd Wade

Author: Cybercrime: Protecting your Business, your Family and Yourself

Todd Wade, author of Cybercrime: Protecting your Business, your Family and Yourself, is the winner of the 2023 Independent Press Award in the Computers category. Todd is a Chief Information Security Officer with over 20 years experience in cyber risk management and technical operational leadership. He is globally recognized as an expert in cybersecurity. In addition to numerous speaking engagements, Todd often appears on leading cybersecurity podcasts. He has been the Chief Information Security Officer for leading fintech, technology and private equity companies as well as the former European CTO of Skechers. Todd earned his MBA from the Trium program (a joint degree from NYU Stern, HEC/Paris, and the London School of Economics). He also holds several industry certifications.

Gabby:

Business and individual financial losses from cybercrime are in the billions. Global losses are over 1 trillion. Victims are in the millions. So why was it important for you to write this book?

Todd:

In the organizations I’ve worked with, it is hard to get people to care about cybersecurity. It’s also hard to change cyber security cultures. What I found really effective is when I make it personal to them, teach them how to improve their own cybersecurity. It’s not just to protect your business. It’s really how to protect the overall family structure. The same things you do individually carry over into the workplace. This is why I wrote the book, to really give people a better chance of defending themselves against the cyber threats that are out there right now.

Gabby:

The perception is that victims are people who are vulnerable, naive, and often the elderly portion of our population. Is there a certain profile of a person or a business who is more prone to cybercrime?

Todd:

It can happen to anyone. Young people are being hit. For some types of cybercrime they’re three times more likely to fall victim. A real problem in our society is victim shaming.

The psychological impact of cyber crime is the same as a real world impact. Most of the time they’ve been taken advantage of. They just have not been prepared to recognize them or to defend against them. In fact, target cybercrime is not a new phenomenon.

Gabby:

In the book, you talk in depth about the historical origins of cybercrime.

Todd:

One of the lessons I want to bring home is cyber fraud and cyber extortion, the two most common types of cyber crime. The underlying methods are historical. They’ve been going on for centuries, the psychological persuasion methods to get the victims into an emotional state before they use these persuasion methods. What’s new is that it’s coming via email.

Gabby:

You’ve said the Internet is magic for criminals.

Todd:

It has been a goldmine for criminals. Individuals in developing countries are now able to very easily victimize individuals in other countries. They’re not going to get arrested in their countries for stealing from individuals in other countries. The success rate, the prosecution rate of any of these individuals is incredibly low and you’re certainly not going to extradite most of them. So it’s almost like a perfect crime.

Gabby:

In the book Todd, you talk about how not to become a victim. You show us how to recognize the sounds of a potential attack, and then you also give us some tools that help prepare us to take action if we are a victim of an attack.

Todd:

One basic is to enable multi-factor authentication across your accounts. It’s only done on Gmail and less than 10% of Gmail users actually enable this feature. The reason why this is so important is if cybercriminals get your username and password to your email account or to any other accounts, they can just log in and get busy, whatever fraud that they want.

You will protect yourself against 90-95% of these types of attacks. Without that code, even if someone has your password, they won’t be able to log in to your Gmail account.

Gabby:

Are the kids, who are all over social media, the population that it affects the most?

Todd:

No, but children are particularly at risk. The parents, I do not think fully understand that and they’re definitely not putting in the necessary protections on social media. It’s now possible to sexually assault someone in another country, in another state. They can just manipulate them through psychological methods.

Gabby:

Obviously, cyber crime is pretty vast. Explain the differences between cyber fraud and cyber extortion.

Todd:

Cyber fraudsters get you to send money or defraud you some way through a whole range of different methods online that I talk about in the book. These are nuanced.

Sometimes they can be a phishing email, sometimes a phone call. Either way, they’re trying to get you to do something.

Cyber extortion is as it sounds. It is going to be instant. Oftentimes with cyber fraud you don’t know it’s a fraud, but with cyber extortion, you immediately know you are in trouble because they have you on their radar and they’re threatening you with some pretty severe consequences if you don’t do what they say.

Gabby:

So, Todd, what’s the number one piece of advice that you can offer our listeners and readers?

Todd:

My piece of advice is when you think or suspect you’re in communication with someone suspicious online, whether it’s a phone call, a text message or whatever it might be, turn off that computer, step away.

You can listen to the full interview here: https://www.independentpressaward.com/thegabtalks/cybercrime Cybercrime: Protecting your Business, Your Family and Yourself is available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.