A Black Swan in Cyberspace

The recent global IT outage, a consequence of an erroneous update of CrowdStrike is an example of a black swan event coming into action. According to Nassim Nicholas Taleb, this concept refers to highly unlikely incidents that have tremendous effects on people’s lives only after they have happened. The incident at Crowdstrike — simply a routine software update — paralytics businesses worldwide and underlines our vulnerability against unforeseen technological hitches.

This black swan event highlights that traditional risk assessment methods which tend to concentrate on known threats are not comprehensive enough. Thus, it underscores the need for wider understanding that appreciates the potentiality of unpredictable incidents.

How then can we be ready to cope with what we least expect? Here are some important points from the Crowdstrike outage:

• Back up redundancy: This can shield us during unforeseen interruptions by having backup systems and data centers.
• Test hard: Strict testing measures may pinpoint and resolve possible problems in updates before users get them.
• Prepare for the impossible: Devise an incident response plan to enable a quick comeback from unanticipated down times.

The Crowdstrike outage is such a wake-up call. Developing resilience against these realities by acknowledging their occurrence as well as implementing stronger security measures through organizations will lead them out of such situations.