The Cloud Security Standard is out, and the ISO27001 author is unhappy.

What tangled webs we weave -David Lacey. Quotes from David Lacey's latest criticism of the "standards industry" include: "The standard [which became ISO27002] aimed to remove 90% of the effort in risk assessment by documenting commonly applied controls. Unfortunately it was hijacked by a consultancy community who subsequently reintroduced the need for mandatory risk assessment. It was also intended to be sufficiently broad and deep to minimise the need for any further standards. Yet two decades on, it has inspired a family of dozens of near identical standards and guidelines.". What has sparked Lacey's ire is the Cloud Security Standard. At 176 pages: "The real challenge however will be to turn this impressive body of knowledge into something of practical use to busy security managers. "


There is a reason I called this column "Practically Secure". Because I know how Mr. Lacey feels. Pragmatism is way down the list of objectives for the authors of today's security standards.


[NB I have finally edited this post to add my commentary, sorry for the delay!]

David Lacey lays into Compliance. Again!

He co-authored BS7799, the forerunner of the now trendy ISO27000 family of documents that describe best practices in Information Security Management. And now he has disowned his own creation as not fit for purpose in the modern age. In his latest blog post The Three Faces of Information Security, David Lacey goes further and decries all compliance thus:-

"Unfortunately, it's all based on collections of ancient practices, with a heavy emphasis on documentation and audits. And if you don't want to pay for security, you simply accept the risk. Your security might be completely ineffective but your paperwork will gain you full marks."

Lacey then goes on to describe "Real Security" as distinct from both compliance and the "business enablement" view of security we sell to management. With a doom and gloom conclusion that "most organizations are sleepwalking into a future crisis" Lacey paints a grim picture of the current state of Information Security.

Is he right? Certainly the continuous stream of breach notifications and ever growing landscape of threats seems to bear this out. We once knew what we were dealing with, or at least thought we did. We don't, not if we are relying on standards written in the 80s and revised six years ago when the term "cloud computing" was still met with giggles and shrugs and "virtualisation" was a software tool fit only for development environments. The future of Infosec demands imagination, foresight, a step change fit for the 201Xs just as BS7799 was a step change in the 1980s. Because the if current trends show anything, it's that we're even worse prepared against the enormous imagination and technical skill of todays malicious agents than we thought we were. But in truth, no more than we deserve to be.