CYBER SECURITY STRATEGY OF MONTENEGRO 2018-2021 Threats and risks in cyberspace Taking into consideration the ultimate goal of cyber activities, threats can be classified into two basic categories: • cyber attacks (attacks by other countries, hacktivism, espionage and sabotage), cyber terrorism and cyber crime (creation of terrorist organisations, attacks by individuals or groups, organised crime), cyberwarfare, • risks caused by human error or natural phenomena. Cyber attacks Numerous activities can be listed under cyber attacks. In many cases the attacks are carried out for the purposes of espionage and sabotage. Espionage refers to the unnoticeable tracking and collection of information and confidential data about a person or a company using different software and services, which can eventually be publicly presented, most often through media. The activities are usually carried out using a method called “backdoor”, which can be special software or be incorporated as a program code in the firmware of a network device and thus deliver information to the attacker. Sabotage achieves certain goals, most often of political nature. In this manner, the processes of institutional work or military action are deliberately interfered with and this enables the removal or takeover of control and command. The most common examples of sabotage are carried out using botnets for DDoS/DoS attacks. During 2016, the companies Kaspersky Lab and B2B International polled about 4,000 companies from 25 countries that were affected by some of the DDoS attacks.7 About 40% of the companies said they believed that the attack had been caused by their competitors, 20% blamed foreign governments and secret service organisations, while 20% suspected that the attacks had been carried out by former employees. The second problem refers to cyber crime and hacktivism. Worldwide, there is an evident increase in the number of malicious software being distributed in different ways. The launching of such software enables stealing of sensitive data, monetary gains, loss of service and eventual destruction of data and devices. Hacktivism is the act of hacking or breaking into a computer system, for political or social reasons. Furthermore, internet penetration enables adequate action by perpetrators of cyber terrorism. Nowadays it is much easier to create terrorist organisations, smaller organised groups, or Kaspersky Lab Finds Businesses are Unclear on How to Combat Targeted Attacks and DDoS Link: https://usa.kaspersky.com/about/press-releases/2017_kaspersky-lab-finds-businesses-are-unclear-on-how-to-combat-targeted-attacks-and-ddos 7 9