The NATO Cooperative Cyber ​​Defense Center of Excellence building in Talinn.

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RAIGO PAJULA / AFP

Cyber ​​warriors operating on the eastern edge of NATO warn that the growing number of people around the world working from home due to the pandemic is increasing vulnerability to cyber attacks.

Estonia is home to two Atlantic Alliance cyber cells, set up following a series of cyber attacks from neighboring Russia more than ten years ago.

"The large-scale use of remote work has attracted spies, thieves and thugs," said Jaak Tarien, director of the NATO Cooperative Cyber ​​Defense Center of Excellence (CCDCOE).

The increased amount of information flowing between institutional servers and home networks creates new challenges for employers.

"We are probably only scratching the surface (of the problem) to assess the extent of malicious activity in the busy cyberspace of the Covid era," said Jaak Tarien.

A European-wide survey in September found that around a third of employees work from home.

Success for cybersecurity courses

"Specialists have set up a working infrastructure, but they cannot control how people use the internet at home or the degree of security" observed, said Mihkel Tikk, head of the ministry's Cyberpolitics department. Estonian Defense.

Nonetheless, the NATO Cyber ​​Defense Center welcomes the growing popularity of its online cybersecurity courses.

Among these courses: "Fighting a botnet attack", "Operational resources in the face of the cyber threat" and "How to ward off attacks and defend IT systems".

As of September 1, these courses have been taken by 6,411 people and the Center is aiming for the threshold of 10,000 by the end of 2020. The Cyber ​​Defense Center was set up following a series of cyber attacks of a unprecedented sophistication on Estonian websites in 2007.

Estonia paid to see

Nowadays, Estonia is facing a "continuous flow of attacks" and countering it requires constant work, said Juri Luik, the country's defense minister.

However, according to him, the situation in his country was "rather good" since he had time to learn from past experiences.

“We have worked diligently to ensure that computer networks are difficult to penetrate and that communication is encrypted - military but also civilian communication,” he said.

“I think it is relatively harder to harm Estonia, compared to many other countries that may not be used to working through cyberspace and have not paid too much attention to cyber defense », He estimated.

According to the minister, all this work would be for nothing without basic cyber hygiene, including password protection.

"This is extremely important and must be remembered - especially now that many people are working from home, via the computer.

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  • High-Tech

  • NATO

  • Estonia

  • Cyber ​​attack

  • Cybercriminality

  • Russia

  • Teleworking

  • Cybersecurity