Task A: Scenario analysis (30 Marks)
The COVID-19 pandemic has unavoidably increased the use of digital technologies. People and organisations all over the world have been forced to adapt to new ways of working and living. The increased number of users in cyberspace enables criminals to engage in a wide range of cybercriminal activities.
The goal of this assessment is to find a real-world cybersecurity breach that occurred within the last two years during COVID-19. Select at least one recent data breach, conduct research, and write an overview of your findings. You should include the following in your summary report:
What was the vulnerability for this security breach, and why was it successful?
What are the potential consequences of this security breach?
How can users safeguard themselves?
Tip : The following link may be useful in locating a security breach.
World’s Biggest Data Breaches & Hacks https://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/worlds-biggest-data-breaches-hacks/
Your task in this assessment is to write a research report. Please refer to the marking guide when preparing your report to see what criteria and standards will be used to assess your work and your progress towards Learning Outcomes 1, 3,4,5 and 6.
Task B: Research report ( 50 Marks )
The Task-B in this assessment is to write a research report. This task is designed to demonstrate your familiarity with the underlying complex technology and industry terminology that will help you leverage the Dark Web and analyse data discovery to strengthen your security position. It will also start your journey towards gaining the knowledge to establish relevant policies and procedures based on research and fact-finding foundations.
Please refer to the marking guide when preparing your report to see what criteria and standards will be used to assess your work and your progress towards Learning Outcomes 1, 3, 4, 5 and 6
Your report will consist of two parts:
Part 1: Annotated Bibliography
Refer to the following resources to help you set up your annotated bibliography
What is an annotated bibliography: https://owll.massey.ac.nz/assignment-types/annotated-bibliography.php
Sample annotated bibliography: https://owll.massey.ac.nz/sample-assignments/sample-annotated-bibliography.php
A set of topics* is listed below. Choose one topic you are really interested in or is closely related to your professional practice.
You are required to conduct a literature search on a topic of your choice. You should choose at least three research papers, journal articles or conference papers). To start you off, you will include the following article.
Karunanayake, I., Ahmed, N., Malaney, R.A., Islam, R.M., & Jha, S.K. (2021). De-Anonymisation Attacks on Tor: A Survey. IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials, 23, 2324-2350. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=9471821
Topics Set*:
Cyber threat hunting
Cybersecurity threat landscape during COVID-19
Malware as a Service (MaaS) during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Cyber-Warfare, Attacks and Defences in the Australian Context
ToR Network
Crypto market and Cryptocurrencies
Dark Web forensics
The security impact of COVID-19 on social media
Bay pointe Security Consulting (BPSC)
CIA (Code Injection Attack)
Social engineering
Data exfiltration
Network traffic analysis
* (You are allowed to select a different topic (not in the list) that is related to the subject but, in that case, please let your Lecturer/subject coordinator know prior to your assessment)
Part 2: Discussion
From your annotated bibliography answer the following discussion questions:
Identify any important issue/s that you believe were not addressed (or not addressed adequately) in the literature.
Explain why you view this issue/these issues as important.
Discuss what you believe to be the most important lesson you have learnt as a result of your literature research.
Develop recommendations on how this knowledge will improve the security of your workplace.
