Former Police Deputy Commissioner Benzi Sau, a member of the board of the White-Hat defense company, spoke about the changes that have taken place in the arena of cyber warfare in recent years in an interview with Arutz Sheva.
According to Sau, if in the past the issue of cyber protection was discussed in terms of national security and terrorists which sought to strike at Israeli targets and disrupt the way of life or damage strategic facilities in Israel, now the picture is different.
"We have been witnessing in the last five years that cyberspace is experiencing a sad turnaround in criminal aspects as well, and we are seeing a growing trend of initiated attacks on the needs of people from small businesses, factories and economic organizations," Sau said.
"This is an economic blow, but no less important is the extraction of a knowledge base within the same organization, for example: law firms, doctors' clinics, or accounting firms. Each of which is small in size or economic scope. As customers, we want the information to be preserved and not to be transferred to the public domain, and if the owner of such a company is attacked and information is taken from him or he is disabled, it is a mortal blow to that firm.
"The police are investing great efforts, budgets, human capital and building units and systems to track, locate and collect evidence against those criminals," he said.
He said that the police have had quite a few successes in this area, such as the hacking of the databases of Bank Leumi a few years ago, an infiltration that was thwarted after a gang of criminals had leaked a lot of information from the bank's servers. However, he notef that there have been many attacks on smaller organizations in cases that have not been exposed to the media.
"Until a few years ago, we were familiar with the classic bank robbery, a threatening thief who holds a gun on the teller and steals the money," he said.
On the level of protection afforded by the police system to the Israeli citizen, Sau said that the police cannot provide personal security for each family, and in his future assessment, "The insurance companies will allow the citizen to purchase a policy that will allow him protection levels for the home and business. Cameras, gates, etc. I estimate that the cyber and insurance companies will also build protective suits for the private home."
About his work at White Hat, he said that it is a company that is well run and keeps the good gous from the bad guys. "The Israel Police has a police commissioner and the police is a good police force," Sau was careful not to give personal grades to the chiefs of staff or the pensioners." Their success is the success of the organization. The police function very well and this is credited to the commissioner."