It was confirmed Saturday evening that aerospace giant Lockheed-Martin was hit by a “minimal” cyber-attack. According to Company and Pentagon officials, the cyber-attack was quickly detected, and no personnel, customer, or program data was compromised. As it is too early to tell the extent of the breach, one conclusion can be that due to the nature of Lockheed-Martin’s business profile (i.e. government contractor, etc.), they were targeted by a foreign government most likely veiled by some underground criminal syndicate. Clearly private corporations, who do business with government entities, need to realize that they are putting themselves on the frontlines for cyber-espionage. Organized cyber-thieves know that many government’s rely on private companies to supplement their bureaucratic departments, which can make those private companies prime targets for unauthorized access to information. Sound data governance protocols are necessary when having a federal or state agency as a client.
