Super fast, super cheap but also super dangerous

After watching the James Cameron’s 3D movie blockbuster Avatar, I have come to agree with Nick Summers’ recent assertion in a newsweek.com piece that the advent of 3D TV is necessary if TV as we know it in the box is to stay alive.

Everyone knows that over the past decade or so, a digital tidal wave has replaced postal mail with e-mail, landlines with cell phones, and home newspaper delivery with news Web sites.

Basically, anyone born after 1980 wants fewer pipes coming into their homes and is immensely picky about the media they consume.

The more stuff we can get over the one pipe —the Internet—the better.

The internet is now properly with us in Kenya – at least since mid last year, 21 years younger and bigger than ever.

This new interconnected world offers a great promise to the advancement of humanity.

But many in our world remain oblivious to the perils of cruising the limitless cyber highways without the requisite understanding or protection.

In May last year, while appointing his head of Cyber Security, President Barack Obama said that cyber threats had become “one of the most serious economic and military dangers the nation faces.”

To emphasise the importance of ICT to the most powerful economy on earth, the new head of cyber security is in a position so high in the Obama administration and reports to the National Security Council and the National Economic Council respectively.

President Obama also called for a new education campaign that keeps the pace with technology, highlighted the need for a cyber-savvy work force and the raising of public awareness of the challenges and threats related to cyber security.

As East Africa joins the rest of the world online, we as Kenyans need to give equal attention to our collective online agenda.

With the evolution of online activities comes the continued evolution of threats.

Historically, hackers and virus writers were kids trying to show off for their friends how clever they were.

They would deface a Web site or break through the security of a system.

They were curious and had a technical interest, they wanted to show off and leave their mark on things.