SFIC ONLINE BRIEFING FOR FAITH LEADERS
ADDRESSES POTENTIAL CYBERSECURITY THREATS & HOW
TO RESPOND AS A RESULT OF RUSSIA'S INVASION OF UKRAINE
Thursday, March 31, 2022
8:30 am - 9:45 am
ZOOM REGISTRATION LINK
(Follow the link below to register for the call. We are taking
this extra step to model best practices for holding virtual meetings).
(if you experience issues opening the link,
please copy and paste the link into your browser bar or change browser)
In a March 2, 2022, account reported in the Catholic News Agency, "Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone's online "Rosary for Peace in Ukraine” was disrupted by a suspected cyberattack, according to the Archdiocese of San Francisco, which reported the incident to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). According to the Archdiocese, a suspiciously large surge of requests to access the event temporarily knocked the Archdiocese's website offline. “The evidence strongly suggests it was a cyberattack,” Father Patrick Summerhays, vicar general and moderator of the curia, said in a statement (that) Wednesday night. The rosary webpage was determined to be responsible for the outage, he said. The pattern of this sudden surge in traffic was consistent with a method of cyber attacking called 'Distributed Denial of Service Attack,' the statement said."
As evidenced by this instance, with tensions in Ukraine escalating, so too are the
threats to cybersecurity. This week's "Online Briefing for Faith Leaders," hosted by
Coordinator Mario F. Garcia, whose presentation will address the current world
events between Russia and Ukraine, and how they could quickly escalate threat
levels across the United States that call for immediate communication to mitigate risk.
Mr. Garcia will also provide information about CISA services and its latest security recommendations, as well as high level recommendations for houses of worship,
small businesses, home, and home office cyber security.
