Cybersecurity: Businesses Are Not Paying Enough Attention to It, and That is Not Okay 

The state of cybersecurity in businesses is in terrible shape, and it keeps getting worse with passing time. Not even a day passes without news of a hack, data spill, or security breach at a company, leading to leaks in corporate secrets.

To begin with, the most obvious ones are the scammers and cyber crooks – who succeed at extorting businesses with ransomware or take hostage of sensitive information such as customer credit cards and corporate data using phishing attacks.

Not many police forces have the needed skills, time, and money to go after these thugs and bring them to justice. Then you have the state-backed hackers that keep switching between cyberwarfare and espionage – the governments either choose to look the other way or sponsor them for their activities.

Who else can be blamed? Maybe the tech companies who are desperately rushing to bring new products to the market to beat their competition – they believe taking shortcuts in security testing is all right to meet their timelines and cut costs. This phenomenon is not limited to start-ups either; you can witness the never-ending flow of security patches that streams from the big tech giants now and then, fixing issues with their software that was not adequately secure when it shipped.

What about the businesses themselves? Software patches are available for the most frequently abused software vulnerabilities. Yet, those weaknesses go unpatched as companies are not willing to invest time and money to fix those flaws by patching their systems. Shockingly, most businesses do not even do simple things like installing SSL certificates to prevent the stealing of their data during transit.

This is just not OK. With so much money being wasted in recovering from cyber-attacks, it only makes sense that businesses wake up to the fact that they need to take cybersecurity seriously and pay enough attention to it.

You cannot solely depend on your tech team for Cybersecurity

If you leave Cybersecurity exclusively to your tech teams, it will fail because of a lack of investment and attention.

Various previous instances can be sighted to prove the point. Security is a boardroom level subject. Way too many breaches happen just because businesses manage data from a technical perspective, but board room meetings do not spend enough time discussing security.

Businesses may adopt the best policies for security- but if they are not enforced, and unpatched systems paired with unmanaged degrees of access for employees carry personal data, then a security breach is merely waiting to happen.

Only if Carphone Warehouse and Talk Talk had implemented basic protections, cyber attackers would not have been able to access their systems. If someone had patched up and updated NHS systems, they would not have had to face the damage caused by WannaCry.

Cyber-attacks are a criminal act, and there will be regular attempts to break into your systems. However, it is up to the businesses to take adequate steps to protect themselves against these cybercriminals.

The executives and boards of companies are expected to be good at balancing opportunities and risks – why then are so many suffering from blind spots when cybersecurity is at stake?

Recommended: The Evolving Role of Cybersecurity Experts in the Era of AI

How can you bolster your Cybersecurity?

Staying on top of the latest cyber threats is not easy – cybercriminals keep coming up with newer cyberattack tactics every day. The bad guys move on when they do not see enough gains for their efforts. 

That is all right for the cybercriminals, but your business must know when that happens, and more crucially, whether your cybersecurity measures are adequate.

Structure your security personnel strategically

• Organization: This is your 1st line of defence as it is embedded in all business processes and is undertaking IT operational.
• Risk assessment: This is the 2nd line of defence – it comprises an independent team that brings all cybersecurity incidents to the attention of the CTO.
• Internal Auditing: This is the 3rd line of defence – internal audits serve as the fine-toothed comb while accessing a business’s ability to manage the risks associated with cybersecurity.

Listen to your employees

Empower your employees to point out any cybersecurity problems without burdening them with processes – have an open culture where no one is afraid of approaching the management to report any security vulnerabilities.

Measure what matters

Use a 3-tier reporting system for the number of incidents – each tier should have a set threshold, after which the reporting is bumped to the next level. Some examples of reporting tiers are internal management, inside risk reporting, and the board.

For vulnerabilities, track the following:

• Number of susceptibilities on systems facing the internet
• Number of unpatched weaknesses at any point in time
• Percentage of software and hardware approaching end-of-life

Plan as if you may lose everything

“Nothing works” does not usually figure on the list when planning cybersecurity. Think about how you will communicate when the email is down. How will you coordinate with external 3rd parties to help you respond?

Planning your cybersecurity reaction must be coupled with business continuity as it anticipates loss of technology or building and brings completeness to cyberattack reaction planning. 

Take necessary security steps such as installing an SSL certificate

Along with installing firewalls, implementing tight security policies, and securing your software/hardware, one of the easiest yet effective measures is to install an SSL certificate on your website. It encrypts the passing data between the browser and the server.

If you have multiple domains and its subdomains, use Multi domain wildcard SSL certificate and secure your domains and its unlimited subdomains – this eases your SSL certificate management while providing the needed protection to all your domains and its subdomains.

Company boards need to have a good handle on intelligence on both business risk and cyber threat. The extent of the grasp on these dangers should cover awareness around potential threats to the business and the vulnerable entry points that can be exploited by cyber attackers to enter the network. From there, the IT department must make plans to update, improve, and secure software, hardware, and network. Businesses must pay enough attention to cybersecurity, and the board must pitch in with strategy and budgeting – only then can IT give security the attention it deserves.