News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Up to 1,500 businesses affected by ransomware attack, Kas... by nine_k on Tuesday July 06, 2021 @01:57PM (#27752041)
I think you should certify systems in place, not engineers.

People without credentials but with experience and care can produce a reasonably secure system. People with credentials but under time pressure and contradictory requirements, and willingness to cut corners, can produce an unsafe system.

It's the system that fails. It can be inspected the way buildings are inspected.

Re:Up to 1,500 businesses affected by ransomware attack, Kas... by rapind on Tuesday July 06, 2021 @02:53PM (#27752778)
Ideally I agree, but I’m not sure it will be effective. There needs to be concrete consequences, and there’s a lot of room to hide.

If we required something like a P.Eng, which (at least theoretically) means you are responsible with real consequences (for say bad building design) then certified employees will be far more reluctant to attach their name to shoddy practices. This bubbles up to the employer. If a client requires you to have certified P.Eng sign off then there’s some reassurance it’s not just going to fall a part.

I don’t think you need this for everything in a stack, but security wise it might be a good idea.

Re:Up to 1,500 businesses affected by ransomware attack, Kas... by mcguire on Tuesday July 06, 2021 @03:51PM (#27753400)
"I don’t think you need this for everything in a stack..."

The problem there is that everything on the stack is a potential hole. The chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

Re:Up to 1,500 businesses affected by ransomware attack, Kas... by mcguire on Tuesday July 06, 2021 @03:49PM (#27753382)
Certification of people is cheaper than certification of systems built by random people. For fun: Try to get a commercial building built that doesn't have an architect and structural engineer (both of which are certified professionals) somewhere in its background.
Re:Up to 1,500 businesses affected by ransomware attack, Kas... by rapind on Wednesday July 07, 2021 @01:34PM (#27763710)
This is a really good point. Because the stakes are so high it makes sense. No one would want to live in a building that's yolo designed. Certifying and insuring it after the fact though would be really hard because a lot of critical decisions are hidden away.

We accept that possibility in SaaS though... for now.

Most successful SaaS applications probably weigh in at 250k LOC or more (I know LOC isn't a great metric, but it serves as an idea of an application's complexity) and will use many libraries that themselves could be questionable. Seems like it would be pretty complicated to certify.

Re:Up to 1,500 businesses affected by ransomware attack, Kas... by MrQuimico on Tuesday July 06, 2021 @02:15PM (#27752275)
I totally agree.