Robust Cybersecurity Plans Are Critical for Digital-First Businesses

5 essential considerations for unified communications

In the modern digital-first business environment, it is more necessary now than ever for companies to invest in protecting their data and cyber assets. In fact, according to some analysts, nearly two-thirds of all enterprises will experience a major cybersecurity breach, while experts agree that cyber-attacks are the fastest growing crime globally. In addition, it’s estimated that cybercrime damages will cost the world $6 trillion annually in just two years’ time.

Due to the nearly-fully digital nature of most companies’ communication channels, these assets are often the most vulnerable to attack, whether via spam, phishing or preying on out-of-date software. This vulnerability is exacerbated further as more and more companies make the shift to the cloud, providing additional avenues for hackers to gain access to critical data.
 
So how can companies best defend their communications and communications tools against the latest cyber threats? Here are five tactics to consider:

Think Outside of ISO 27001

Most well-known security standards or frameworks are not reactively designed and do not
guarantee well-designed information security management systems. In fact, the primary purpose of the security standard ISO 27001 is informational security risk assessment, treatment and mitigating. However, it contains many risk factors itself. For example, introducing best practices without any concrete technology, design or processes required, or describing procedures that assign too much trust to the human factor in ISMS, can prompt ISO 27001 to create gaps in a company’s cybersecurity capabilities. 

Ensure Security is Top-of-Mind for Company Leaders

Because senior managers have wide-ranging responsibilities that include but aren’t limited to cybersecurity, they aren’t as familiar with the risks associated with an inadequate cybersecurity process. As a result, they are less inclined to invest in the necessary infrastructure and staff to ensure they tap into the best line of defence against cyber criminals.
 
Therefore, it is critical for all risks and associated implications of security breaches be proactively shared with senior management, including a robust assessment of the potential financial and reputational impacts. Armed with this critical intel, decision makers can make informed decisions about how to prioritize specific cybersecurity tools and investments across their businesses. 

Manage Crises and Incidents More Closely

In today’s digital-first business environment, security incidents of some level are inevitable, and any security incident is a potential crisis if not processed properly. One basic action companies can take is to create rules for classifying incidents with different priorities depending on the potential impact. This enables employees who process to provide a timely, correct and detailed response. In addition, it may be helpful to leverage reports generated by Information Security Management Systems (ISMS) to analyse a company’s cybersecurity vulnerabilities and take remedial action, as well as calculate potential risks.
 
Understanding crises is critical for people at every level of an organization, because a crisis indicates an unstable and dangerous situation related to a segment of the company, or the company at large, with potentially damaging business implications. Often, this requires swift and immediate action to resolve or mitigate the crisis. Unfortunately, many companies do not currently have an optimized crisis management process or proper staff training procedures in place. 

Regularly Review and Optimize ISMS

To reduce the likelihood of malfunction or failure, its crucial for companies to perform maintenance and revisions, continually optimizing their ISMS. This may include reacting to current threats and vulnerabilities by adjusting on a regular basis the security policies and procedures, security change management control and reviewing the risk register. 

Refer to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) framework

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is a physical sciences laboratory, and a non-regulatory agency of the United States Department of Commerce. This voluntary framework consists of standards, guidelines, and best practices to manage cybersecurity-related risk designed for U.S. private sector organizations. The steps illustrated in the NIST framework are Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond and Recover.
 
However, good security officers should not wait until an issue to arises to improve security or to adopt predefined standards like ISO 27001. Instead, they need to plan daily, embrace agility, and create a cybersecurity- focused culture across their entire business. If they do that correctly, then the business will give itself the best chance to defend itself against the next cyber-attack.   

Conclusion

While the conveniences of globalization are clear, the consequences – like exposure to cyber security threats –open companies up to more vulnerabilities, which become more challenging to guard against with each passing day. Businesses must be quicker than ever when developing and optimizing technologies, standards, and frameworks. This is because the evolution of cyber threats also happens quickly in real-time. Cybersecurity must become a priority, and organizations must agree on an approach that works best for their individual companies’ needs.