Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | May 24, 2021 | Worcester Business Journal 23 Many brave choices led to Worcester's seminal Red Sox moment V I E W P O I N T E D I T O R I A L I n 2007, Dino Lorusso – a plumber by trade – decided to buy and renovate the abandoned Crompton Loom Works building into a retail center in one of Worcester's poorer neighbor- hoods. Lorusso's decision on the cusp on the Great Recession turned out to be a pivotal one in the history of the Canal District. Fast forward 14 years to May 11, 2021 and the Worcester Red Sox played their first game at the $160-million Polar Park, the culmination of three years of work by city, team, and construction officials. Worcester has received a great deal of buzz from media outles like the Boston Globe, Boston's TV stations and even the New York Times about the team. Was the arrival of the Boston Red Sox top minor league affiliate the signal Worcester had fulfilled its destiny as New England's second largest city? Perhaps, but a lot led up to this moment. at Worcester buzz was building well before the WooSox arrived on the scene, built brick by brick by Lorusso and others who took their own chances, and those investments and entrepreneur- ial energy transformed a neighborhood. e first people to tell you that Worcester's buzz was tangible before they arrived on the scene are the WooSox officials themselves. Dan Rea, executive vice president for the team, oen says when the team was considering leaving Pawtuck- et, R.I., officials wanted to join momentum in a city already on the upswing. People like Rea and WooSox Chairman Larry Lucchino didn't want to transform a downtrodden community, but wanted to join a wave already in motion. Lorusso's creation of the Crompton Place retail complex led to local entrepreneur Amy Lynn Chase opening up her unique boutique Crompton Collec- tive, and she was joined over time by locally owned businesses like BirchTree Bread Co. and Seed to Stem. Well before the Canal District was as polished as it is today, going to Chase's store meant parking in the dirt (and oen muddy) lot next to Crompton Place, adding a sense of adventure to the already authentic feeling of shopping someplace local and truly unique. en local resident-turned-developer Allen Fletch- er would turn that empty dirt lot into the Worcester Public Market and Kelley Square Los, a $21-million new construction project in a neighborhood filled with historic (and oen deteriorating) buildings. Fletcher embraced Worcester's flavor, filling up the public market with uniquely local vendors. e 48 apartments built over the market sold out quickly, proving there was demand for both retail and resi- dential development. Fletcher's building opened at the start of 2020, and along with the planned stadium, set the stage for yet another round of new development, which includes big residential/mixed-use plans for the existing Table Talk Pies manufacturing facility and e Cove Music Hall. All the attention this spring around the arrival of WooSox has been a win for Worcester. at victory, though, was set up by a long line of brave innovators who took a chance and reinvented the Canal District into one of the hottest development zones around. The above Editorial is the opinion of the WBJ Editorial Board. The Viewpoint column, the A Thousand Words cartoon, and the Word from the Web commentary represent the opinions of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of WBJ or its staff. WBJ welcomes letters to the editor and commentary submissions. Send them to bkane@wbjournal.com. F or Georgia, Virgina, the Carolinas and other states, it was Jimmy Carter revisited as long lines and price spikes awaited motorists at the gas pumps. Some sta- tions as far south as St. Petersburg, Fla. ran out entirely, wor- rying travelers making plans for Memorial Day weekend. We learned a few things from the Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack: fuel travels at 5 mph, and despite the FBI's advisory against paying cybercriminals, Colonial's vast 5,500-mile infrastructure for moving fuel couldn't wait. Although details from the company are scant, it allegedly paid 75 Bitcoin, or roughly $5 million, to the hackers to decrypt Colonial's proprietary data. Actual pipelines were not physically damaged, but the company was forced to terminate fuel flows because its cus- tomer billing system was taken offline. is kind of national headline news is typical in my everyday life as CEO of Towerwall, where we help local com- panies with their security challenges. at criminals can commandeer access to a private network for illicit gain, encrypt the crown jewels, then threaten to sell or dump them on the dark web is sadly no longer newsworthy: this happens alarmingly all too oen. Cybercrime markets have grown increasingly sophisticated. Ransomware-as-a-service kits are freely sold, complete with tech support. Our security partner Sophos found 51% of organizations surveyed were victims of ransomware, paying an average of $732,520 in total associated costs in downtime, people time, device cost, network cost, lost opportunity, and ransom paid. Colonial has pipelines of a different sort pointing inter- nally to its offices – all 869 of them – one for each employee, each representing a phishing target. Even with technology interventions installed, people still prove to be the weakest link in any defense posture. A Stanford study cites 88% of incidents caused by workers clicking on a phishing bait. Help is available. A lot can be done to avoid becoming the next Colonial. Having cyber-insurance benefits not just in mitigation efforts but in prevention. Insurers are finan- cially motivated to minimize their risk, so they will typically run a thorough assessment of your business to uncover weaknesses. Many security breaches happen via third-par- ties, so it's everyone's responsibility to monitor for updates. Are ex-employees still on your system? Access needs to be restricted to authorized users, and everybody should use multi-factor authentication to access your network. Use of 24/7 threat monitoring, detection and response services offer businesses a turnkey security approach. Combined with penetration testing and endpoint device monitoring, MDR services are designed to reduce the time it takes to detect and respond to threats, the most common being ransomware, phishing, and data the. Without a sizable IT department, small and midsized should consider outsourcing their cybersecurity needs to gain protection from business disruption. Detecting threats early is the best way to protect against cyberattack losses. Michelle Drolet is CEO of Framingham cybersecurity services provider Towerwall. BY MICHELE DROLET Special to the Worcester Business Journal Michele Drolet W W A T H O U SA N D WO R D S B Y R A M Ó N L . S A N D O V A L Phishing is the worst thing for your business

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