A Play on Poe for a Business IT Halloween Lesson

Things have always gone bump in the night, and so we’ve always told horror stories to help us process these fears. While these bumps once came from dangerous animals and the other hazards of the time, they have evolved and become digital. 

Since it’s Halloween time, we wanted to take a page from the master of the macabre, Edgar Allen Poe, and update one of his poems for a more modern audience… so, without further ado, here is our reimagining of The City in the Sea.

The Pity in the C-Suite

Look! The boss reared himself a throne,
In vacant office, seated alone
In harsh fluorescent lights
With the screens and the keys and the bits and the bytes
Abandoned for the workday’s night.
And look, his workstation stays active
(doggedly holding true to its post!)
Revealing what holds him captive.
Data, the one thing he needs most,
Now locked away beyond his reach,
Encrypted vault, data breached.

The ransom demanded would spell the end,
With damage far too big to mend.
His thoughts, in desperation, turn 
To backups saved for such concern  
No clue to what he was soon to learn.
He clicks, and clicks, and clicks again, 
clicks his way to the cloud, but then  
Upon reaching salvation prospective
This boss finds all backups defective. 
Instead of the data that was expected 
Secure, redundant, protected
His safeguard, it was also infected.
Now locked away beyond his reach,
Encrypted vault, data breached.
So where hope supplied a bit of peace
Was only proof business would cease.
And so, alone and in panicked thought,
The boss felt his throat start to knot.

He pictured what must surely be,
Shame, failure, and regulator’s fees
That every dollar, all and each
Would from his coffers soon be leeched 
No funds left to pay his team,
The death of pride, hopes, and dream.
And that data then exposed!
Damage long past when business closed
As threats like these will oft return
Continuing to bring concern.
The dark web gives a place to swap
These spoils in illicit shops.

He waits, brow bent into a crease
To see the cost of a new lease
Knowing well within his heart of hearts
No payment assures work restarts.
He steels his heart to sadly explain
That their careers no longer remain.
All because a hacker had found
All they needed to run them aground
And so, because this hacker won,
Undermining their sole defense,
business itself would soon be done,
No means of recompense.

In All Seriousness, Cyberthreats Have Gotten Worse…

…and will continue to do so as time goes on. This revised poem is not exaggerated in the slightest. Modern cybercriminals do indeed seek to infiltrate a network and wait, identifying any backups they can find so they can steal and infect their contents as well.

This makes it even more crucial that all of your protections—technological and behavioral alike—are just as ready to deal with cyberthreats as that one house on the block is to hand out candy (we all have one). We can help with that, so make sure you give us a call at (254) 848-7100 after your horror movie marathon is over. Happy Halloween!