Eric Winsborrow: Confessions of a Cyber Spy Hunter

Vocabulary:

Permeate smth – to affect every part of smth

Confluence – the fact of two or more things becoming one

Y2K — the Year 2000 problem, also known as the Y2K problem, the Millennium bugY2K bug, the Y2K glitch, or Y2K, refers to events related to the formatting and storage of calendar data for dates beginning in the year 2000. Problems were anticipated, and arose, because many programs represented four-digit years with only the final two digits – making the year 2000 indistinguishable from 1900. The assumption of a twentieth-century date in such programs could cause various errors, such as the incorrect display of dates and the inaccurate ordering of automated dated records or real-time events. (Wikipedia)

Email-borne virus – a virus delivered by an email message

To clog up – to block

Leg – a part of a journey, or race, or a game, syn. a stage, a section

Centrifuge – a machine with a part that spins around to separate substances, e.g. liquids from solids, be forcing heavier substances to the outer edge

Compound – an area surrounded by a fence or wall in which a factory or other group of buildings stands

Watch and answer the following questions:

1) What is the primary function of the company Eric is in charge of?

2) What are the customers of the company that he heads?

3)What is the distinctive feature of cyber espionage today?

4) How do you understand the speaker’s metaphor “Today James Bond IS technology”?

5)What example of viruses does the speaker give?

Reproduce the context of the following:

  • To give us a front-row seat in actions
  • Battles fought with bits and bytes
  • A merging between man and machine
  • They [Hollywood] don’t go far enough
  • I love you
  • Code Red
  • Sneakerware
  • The era of the cyber spy
  • Nuclear fuel enrichment facility
  • Operation Olympic Games

Define the topic and the thesis of the talk