EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

From the local perspective, the San Francisco Bay Area’s beloved Golden State Warriors are so yesterday. FIFA World Cup soccer is what people care about now. Kicking off in Russia today, the series has captured the attention of sports enthusiasts and raised concerns among cybersecurity professionals.

The worries range from garden-variety fear of cyberattacks against businesses or infrastructure supporting the World Cup, to IT pros sneaking away to watch the match, to soccer fans traveling to Russia with their smart devices — potentially putting themselves more at risk than if traveling elsewhere.

Alarmingly, SC Media reports that out of a survey of 326 professionals, “30 percent of them suggested they would wait until after a crucial match to fix an urgent corporate security issue.” Yikes. Can you tell I don’t follow soccer?

In that same study, 72 percent “believe a cyberattack against the event in the form of a DDoS attack, social media channel hack, email correspondence or mobile threats is likely.”

For those traveling to the World Cup, admonitions abound. Wired reports that journalists, activists, politicians, and other high-profile people run especially high risk of being surveilled. Quoting the top US counterintelligence official, Wired writes, “If you’re planning on taking a mobile phone, laptop, PDA, or other electronic device with you—make no mistake—any data on those devices (especially your personally identifiable information) may be accessed by the Russian government or cybercriminals.”

Cybercriminals do like their notoriety and with 3.4 billion estimated viewers and at least 2.4 million live fans (based on tickets sold in advance), that’s a lot of attention.

Get the full story at SC Media.