To our knowledge, no one has ever been successful. As the Internet has broadened its reach, the types of organizations reporting intrusions also have increased. Both fraud and denial of service are increasing, and this trend is likely to continue. Very often, when people come to the Internet, they don't understand the risks and threats, and they come ill-prepared. Pethia notes that many attackers target newly established sites on the Internet as the most vulnerable and view them as opportunities.
CERT offers two types of training courses for managers and technical staff.
One area covers incident response, and the other involves helping system administrators to understand the necessary steps for protecting their systems. CERT also publishes a series of documents on best practices and tips. It is vital for managers to understand their systems and identify the critical operating areas that need protection, Pethia states. Trying to protect every asset at the same level probably is unaffordable, he notes. Instead, managers should determine the sensitive data that needs protection, especially the corporate assets that must be guarded against theft or alteration.