GoKawiilOver the past two decades, cyber has evolved into a board-level business risk, with early Internet worms and endpoint viruses giving way to industrial-grade operations that can disrupt hospitals, utilities, and supply chains, erode public trust, and rattle markets. The lesson for security leaders is straightforward: in a hyperconnected enterprise, the blast radius is no longer just digital, it’s operational and strategic.
As part of Dark Reading's 20th anniversary celebration, our staff takes a look back at the biggest cyber moments in the past two decades that have rewritten the playbook for security teams and changed the face of how we perceive cybersecurity threats and defense strategies. We revisit the impact of WannaCry and NotPetya; the SolarWinds compromise; Colonial Pipeline; the rise of Anonymous; the birth of ChatGPT; and much more.
As we examine these 20 defining moments, we also consider their present-day ramifications, and their legacy can’t be overstated. Liability concerns now abound, with disclosure rules, critical infrastructure directives, and sector-specific obligations raising the stakes for CISOs and boards. Attacker automation (including with AI) and supercharged exploit pipelines are compressing defenders’ response windows. There's also been a steady rise of intrusions that degrade operations and safety, not just data; and ransomware has become a core operations risk. And meanwhile, supply chain vectors and identity abuse now challenge the limits of how attackers can reach their victims, especially in the age of agentic AI and non-human identities.
Join us as we revisit a few major catalysts for these evolutions, gleaned from Dark Reading's 20 years of comprehensive industry coverage.
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