5G is coming, bringing with it speedier connections and higher bandwidth. But what about security? As with most things related to technology, there’s good and bad, according to Kevin McNamee, director of threat intelligence at Nokia. It’s a two-sided coin.
5G is inherently more secure than previous wireless standards, but also vastly increases the attack surface as Internet of Things (IoT) devices proliferate, McNamee said. Monitoring, automation and secure communications will be essential to securing 5G investments, he added. His remarks came during a breakout session as part of (ISC)2Security Congress 2020, taking place virtually this week.
Kevin McNamee, director of threat intelligence, Nokia
On the positive side, McNamee said, 5G uses HTML2/TLS-based secure services, which are more robust and make it very difficult to crack the control plane. 5G’s BroadForward Security Edge Protection Proxy, which ensures end-to-end confidentiality between networks, provides secure communications for roaming users.
5G also enables network slicing, allowing separation data between applications and services so that, for instance, communications involving banking, medical and financial data are isolated from each other.
Security Concerns
Even with the improved security that 5G delivers, McNamee warned that 5G significantly widens the attack surface. As organizations deploy geographically dispersed IoT networks with thousands of devices, they are creating more opportunities for DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks and other cyber threats.
IoT devices do not have the security protections of traditional IT endpoints such as smartphones and laptops. “You are going to have all of these IoT devices, and the IoT devices for the most part are not ..
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