In a Growing Threat Landscape, Companies Must do Three Things to Get Serious About Cybersecurity
Every enterprise should see itself as a cybersecurity company. It doesn’t matter what industry they’re in or how big they are: To avoid the potentially disastrous impact of breaches, they must go above and beyond to prioritize the security of their tech stack from the top of their organization and down.
Several macro-trends – such as growing digital transformation, rising hybrid work and, especially, booming AI adoption – have created an increasingly sophisticated threat landscape. In this environment, any companies that continue on as they always have will eventually find themselves suffering the consequences. These consequences can be dire, including lost revenue, declining brand reputation, poor employee morale and serious legal hangups.
Making this shift requires several tactical choices – from implementing multi-factor authentication to comprehensive ransomware protection. But in this article, I’m going to focus on the higher-level, strategic things an organization must do to operate like a security company.
The C-Suite and Board Leaders Must Drive Cultural Change
It starts at the C- and board level. These high-ranking leaders must take charge in prioritizing cybersecurity for any meaningful changes to be made. Organizational transformation can’t come simply from the IT or security team, it’s a top-down effort. Individual departments can lead the way in adopting new technologies, but they can’t drive enterprise-wide cultural shift.
From a practical standpoint, execs and the board make budget decisions about every domain, including security. Unlike other domains, cybersecurity isn’t a profit center for most businesses, so it often gets underfunded compared to business units and projects that generate revenue.
That’s a problem. If executives understand how much is at stake from a fundamental business level, they will invest in bolstering their cybersecurity posture. Cybersecurity is essential to protecting profit centers and enabling them to safely grow. And more and more, customers are looking at a company’s security bonafide when making their buying decisions.
It’s in the execs’ self-interest to take charge in adopting a cybersecurity posture as they will ultimately be held accountable in the event of catastrophe. If a company suffers a significant breach that’s so severe it impacts its bottom line (such as the SolarWinds hack), the high-ranking leaders will lose their jobs first.
Fearless CISOs are Liaisons to Other Leaders
It’s also essential to have an honest, objective CISO at the helm of cybersecurity who has power at the executive table. The C-suite and board won’t ever know how to effectively prioritize security unless they have a CISO guiding them accordingly.
Communication is central here. There has to be open discussion between the CISO and the rest of the C-suite regularly. The former must be able to tell executives where the company is weak in cybersecurity – especially where things are critical – and the other leaders have to trust the CISO enough to heed their counsel and authorize any required changes or investments. For example, a CISO should be able to say, “We’re at red in infrastructure monitoring or ransomware protection.” Then the CEO greenlights increased the budget for those items.
When a CISO feels unsupported and ignored, problem areas only fester and the likelihood of a disaster grows. They must be treated like CFOs and CIOs, given a voice and power that reaches beyond their department.
Adopt NIST CSF 2.0 to Achieve Cybersecurity Fundamentals
Finally, to behave like a security company, organizations need to adopt the NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) Cybersecurity Framework 2.0. The NIST is a part of the US Department of Commerce that promotes standards that drive innovation and competitive across various industries. While the organization covers several technological and scientific domains, it’s primarily focused on cybersecurity today.
NIST’s CSF 2.0 is “designed to help organizations of all sizes and sectors — including industry, government, academia and nonprofit — to manage and reduce their cybersecurity risks. It is useful regardless of the maturity level and technical sophistication of an organization’s cybersecurity programs.”
The emphasis is on prevention, protection and response, providing a comprehensive set of best practices to guard against threats and recover from any incidents. Flexibility is a key facet: The CSF is a living set of guidelines that evolves to keep pace with the rapidly changing threat landscape.
Enterprises that adopt this framework of course won’t be immune to threats, but they’ll ensure they have implemented the fundamentals necessary to create a serious cybersecurity posture. Furthermore, if something does happen, companies that have adopted NIST 2.0 may lower their liability against potential lawsuits as they can prove they’re following best practices, demonstrating that any breach or incident was outside of their control.
New Cybersecurity Landscape Demands Committed Approach
In the age of AI, we’re seeing new, powerful attack vectors emerge all the time. Businesses can only mitigate these sophisticated threats at an institutional level. No matter the sector – healthcare, hospitality, retail, etc. – every organization should rethink its posture in the face of these dangers and start behaving like a cybersecurity company.
