The Auto Industry: The Next "Big" Target For Hackers?

Given the exponential rise in security breaches and hacking activity in past few years and the almost constant headlines in the press of yet another major security breach, information security should be a front burner issue for every business. While the auto industry has, for the most part, avoided being a primary target for hackers in the past, having only faced research demonstrating "possible" attacks, that is likely to change in the near future. There are four reasons for that change:

1. Big Data. Carmakers, dealerships, and their suppliers and vendors have developed extremely large databases of consumer information, ranging from customer preferences, to financial information, to driving statistics, to location-based data. These huge databases make tempting targets for hackers. They are also drawing the attention of regulators who are increasingly viewing dealerships as financial institutions in terms of the magnitude of personal consumer information collected in