The signs are everywhere; Wall Street has fallen into deep recess, consumers aren't buying, houses aren't being built or sold, and criminals are breaching companies at an alarming rate. The economic conditions of today's reality combined with the need to continue to survive financial has thrown gasoline on the hacking fire in recent weeks.

Whether you're looking at the intrusions and catastrophes at Heartland Payment Systems (HPS), SRA International, or the Wyndham Hotels - the writing is on the wall. Actually, it's no longer writing on the wall, it's a flashing neon sign over the freeway - "Criminals Are After You". It's only a matter of time before your web sites, applications and precious databases are infiltrated and bled dry for every drop of information.

The problems that are going on outside your corporate walls aren't any better internally. Insider fraud continue to mount in this type of depressed economy, just wait until someone in one of your call centers starts to skim credit cards and cardholder information... there is nothing you can do about it. The scary thing is that you, as the security leader, couldn't prevent this problem even if you had any money left in your budget. Criminal Organizations (read: the mob) have figured out that sometimes, rather than employing expensive hackers, they can simply find an internal employee who's willing to be pushed over the edge for a payout and commit that next big insider crime. Let's face it, you have to trust at least *some* of your employees... right?