Here’s some insight outlining what is going on cybersecurity-wise when the Chiefs and 49ers duke it out tomorrow
The federal government has quite the security doozy on its hands going into an election year, with events like Super Bowl LVIII going on as well. However, this is nothing that cannot be handled by an interagency task force dedicated to the physical and digital protection of Super Bowl LVIII patrons, participants, and spectators around the world. Though, there are a lot of complexities and build-up to something like this, which the government gives some insights into with posts outlining what all is going on when the Chiefs and 49ers duke it out on the field.Cybersecurity And Infrastructure Agency – CISA’s Role
Last year, Microsoft published a report on the rising digital threats against live high-profile sporting events such as the Super Bowl. The global sports market is valued at $600 billion, meaning there is a lot of value in the data that passes through this industry, including that which directly relates to teams as well as that which touches “critical business services, such as point-of-sale devices, I.T. infrastructures, and visitor devices.” To help address this swelling problem, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is deployed every year to the Super Bowl to help protect the digital footprint of one of the largest sporting events in the world. This effort likely began well prior and is an ongoing effort, but publicly started regarding SBLVIII back in September of 2023.
Last year, CISA noted that it was running a tabletop exercise to “explore, assess, and enhance cybersecurity response capabilities, plans, and procedures ahead of Super Bowl LVIII.” This four-hour exercise brought together 100 partners to “discussed a hypothetical scenario that included phishing, ransomware, a data breach, and a potential insider threat – all with cascading impacts on physical systems.” It is unclear what exactly that meant, and it isn’t published for operational security, but it can be simplified to exploring how an attacker might breach the security of the Super Bowl and what outcomes could come of that, such as system outages or more esoteric things like the enabling of all fire sprinklers or something absurd like that.
