Edinburgh Napier University

  The growing extent to which our day-to-day infrastructure is computer-controlled and internet-connected leaves it open to the possibility that malicious hackers could intercept data or take control of devices. Often this sort of critical infrastructure is obvious, for example in electricity generation or supply, in large datacentres where hundreds or thousands of web-based companies are based, or in financial services. But often it is the least obvious elements that are most open to attack. For example, attacking the air conditioning system at a datacentre could cause catastrophic overheating of the computers there. Or affecting the control of traffic around a city or region, reducing roads to gridlock. As we move towards a situation where computers control and optimise our lives using the data they record about us, our dependence on them grows, as does their vulnerability to failure. Protecting the technology we rely on for our day-to-day lives from attack or failure must be a priority.