Today's spear-phishing campaigns are localized, small and can slip through typical spam filters. As a result, detection practices have to evolve, says researcher Gary Warner of the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

NIST's Ron Ross, a big NASCAR fan, likens new security controls guidance to the tools race-car builders use to prevent drivers from breaking their necks when crashing into a brick wall at 200 miles an hour.

Security firm Mandiant recently released a widely publicized report detailing cyber-espionage activity originating in China. Mandiant Director Charles Carmakal discusses the latest nation-state threats.

The massive distributed-denial-of-service attack in Europe that targeted Spamhaus could easily have been prevented if information service providers followed a 13-year-old industry best practice, ENISA's Thomas Haeberlen says.

When Richard Nealon first sat for his CISSP exam, he was struck by how U.S.-centric the questions were. Since then, he has strived to promote greater awareness of global information security concerns.

NIST's Donna Dodson is leading a federal government effort to take hundreds of suggestions from the private sector to create an IT security best practices framework that critical infrastructure operators could voluntarily adopt.

Although there have not yet been any confirmed reports of financial fraud associated with a major data breach at the Utah Department of Health last year, the potential for costly fraud is huge, contends Al Pascual of Javelin Strategy and Research.

It isn't just the quantity of cyber-attacks that's staggering; it's the quality. The average hacker now has access to nation-state-level attack capabilities, says James Lyne of Sophos. How can organizations defend?

It isn't a staffing shortage that we face, but rather a skills crisis, says Allan Boardman, international vice president of ISACA. How can organizations build the security skills they need to mitigate evolving risks?

Organizations face new cyber-risks from their third-party service providers. But standard contracts fail to cover these risks. Trend Micro's Tom Kellermann discusses the risk management essentials.