Is NASA failing in its Cybersecurity?

According to Business Insider, hackers accessed NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA in April 2018. An Office of the Inspector General report says that a hacker has stolen 500 megabytes of data from 23 files which also consists of information on the Mars Mission.

The hacker targeted an unauthorized Raspberry Pi which is a small computer used for making DIY projects. Through Raspberry Pi, a hacker was able to access this network.

The report says that this incident unveils flows and weakness of Cybersecurity, as any devices can be added to a network without any identification and investigation by security officials. Any device should not be added to the network without being scrutinized.

It was found in the report that system administrators do not consistently update the inventory system when any devices are added to the network.

The inventory spreadsheet requires manual updating and do not do so if the database is not working or system administrators forget to update it.