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In 2022, cyberattacks surged by 38%, impacting 422 million lives. See more scary stats here. This reality underscores the crucial importance of cybersecurity hygiene in today's digital age. As organizations increasingly rely on technology and data-driven operations, the threat landscape has grown exponentially. Cyberattacks, data breaches, and malicious activities now pose severe risks to sensitive information and a company's reputation. The need for strong cybersecurity practices has never been greater, ensuring your organization's resilience against potential threats, safeguarding valuable data, and maintaining the trust of your customers.
It all starts with proper cyber hygiene, the essential habits and practices businesses put in place to ensure long-term success. Just like brushing your teeth or regularly showering, focusing on your organization's health first can pave the way for effective cybersecurity initiatives and successful future opportunities.
Here's everything you need to know to get prepared for the present and future in risk management and response. This comprehensive guide will help you assess your current cyber hygiene practices and educate you on current threats and trends, enabling you to capitalize on new opportunities and proactively safeguard your company's well-being. Want something a bit more bite-sized? We’ve got you covered. Stay ahead of cyber threats with these must-know insights for modern organizations.
Let’s dive in!
Cybercrime is a nightmare for everyone - in fact, more Americans are afraid of a cyberattack than a nuclear attack - but for businesses that are entrusted with highly sensitive data and personal identifiable information (PII), the pressure is on. There were over 4,000 successful data compromises in 2022, including household names and entire countries.
2022 was a busy year in cybersecurity, from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to landmark elections around the world to the worldwide release of ChatGPT, Midjourney, and other generative AI tools. The convergence of social, economic, and technological factors in security is shaping a new landscape that demands collaboration between companies, governments, and individuals to foster a safer ecosystem.
As the threats of cybercrime loom larger than ever, the shortage of well-trained and equipped experts to combat these threats remains a significant concern. Organizations of all sizes experienced the impact of these challenges towards the end of last year and the beginning of 2023, with high-profile layoffs making headlines. Yet, there's a silver lining as U.S. businesses prioritize cybersecurity investments, recognizing that cybersecurity teams will be least affected by staff reductions, given the anticipation of increased cyber threats throughout 2023.
As we navigate this ever-evolving landscape, staying up to date on the latest risks and trends becomes daunting yet essential for businesses. Daily emerging threats, the constant search for experienced cyber talent, and the rapid advancement of AI technologies necessitate staying ahead of the curve.
Outlined below are 5 trends that should drive decision-making in an efficient and effective way to address all three pillars of cybersecurity: social, economic, and technological.
Interested in learning more? Check out our 2023 Cyber Pulse, a midyear report about different cybersecurity trends and predictions we’re seeing in the marketplace.
Before you can create an effective risk management plan, you need to understand your own risk level and gaps. The first step is understanding what cyber risk means. Here’s a great podcast to help you understand what goes into evaluating cybersecurity risk levels.
Now, how do you find out what your cyber risk level is? The best way to find out is to have a third party review your systems and do an objective, thorough assessment of your organization’s strengths and weaknesses. This process generally includes:
Can you determine your risk level yourself? Possibly, but it can be challenging. People’s existing biases and assumptions can create blind spots in a cybersecurity risk assessment—and blind spots are exactly the type of thing that gives cybercriminals a foot in the door. Given the extreme consequences of a major cybersecurity breach, the cost of a vulnerability scan and risk assessment are worth the expense.
Once you understand exactly how healthy your systems are and where they could use some help, it’s time for remediation planning—creating a risk management framework to address the identified vulnerabilities and enhance your cybersecurity measures across the organization.
A robust cybersecurity risk management plan takes more than tools. To be truly resilient, your framework must cover technology, data management, employee engagement, third-party vendor relationships, and more. This section walks through the main business functions your plan needs to include in the digital age.
Every organization knows that cybersecurity is an essential business investment. But companies often fall into the trap of spending lots of money on cybersecurity solutions that don’t actually serve the organization's purposes. Our Cybersecurity Studio Director compiled a list of common mistakes businesses make when investing in cybersecurity solutions.
Now, onto the plan.
The fundamentals of cybersecurity for a business are the same across most organizations. Some, like having strong passwords, seem obvious—but just as the keys to healthy living are eating right and staying active, the keys to cyber hygiene are simple to understand yet often difficult to maintain.
88% of all data breaches are caused by an employee mistake, such as succumbing to a social engineering attack like phishing. That’s why it is absolutely vital to get everyone in your organization on board with your cybersecurity initiatives.
One expensive mistake many organizations make when implementing a cybersecurity plan is failing to include a change management plan. Simply dropping new security solutions onto a team rarely yields good results, especially if the solutions counter existing organizational culture. For example, implementing a complex and rigid security framework might offer robust protection, but it could also impede employees' ability to collaborate effectively and slow down critical business processes.
Here are three reasons change management is essential during cybersecurity initiatives:
An organization that successfully gets everyone on board and actively contributing to the business’s security is a healthy organization. It takes work, from educating your employees on common types of data breaches and your industry’s specific regulations, to soliciting feedback on a changing environment, to providing effective training that your team will actually engage with. This alone could reduce your organizational risk level significantly.
Not having a healthy organization during cybersecurity efforts can have severe consequences, as seen in the 2013 Target data breach. Cybercriminals stole over 40 million customers’ credit and debit card information by exploiting an employee’s access credentials from a third-party vendor. While Target had inadequate security controls, the breach also resulted from a lack of change management and insufficient employee training, which allowed the cybercriminals to go undetected for weeks.
Your organization’s security efforts don’t stop at your own doors. 98% of organizations worldwide have integrations with at least one third-party vendor that has been breached in the last two years. According to the same report, third-party vendors are five times more likely to exhibit poor security.
Top cybersecurity risks associated with third-party vendors include:
Your business is part of a complex supply chain, and supply chain cybersecurity has never been more important. Every organization that touches yours is another opportunity for cybercriminals to access your data—in the infamous 2013 Target breach, for instance, cybercriminals accessed the company’s systems by stealing an HVAC subcontractor's login credentials and exploiting trusted access to infiltrate Target's network.
Here’s how to partner with the vendors in your ecosystem to keep everyone secure (click HERE to learn more).
The control a company has over third-party vendors has historically been limited. However, in the era of open-source and AI-enhanced cybersecurity, partnering with vendors to put up a united front against cyberattacks is becoming much more widespread and expected.
For more on understanding third-party risk and remediation, check out this podcast episode with Mike Bochniarz, Head of Third Party Risk Management at Cross River Bank:
To review, your cybersecurity plan should cover:
Want help moving further down this checklist? Launch has a Future State of Cybersecurity Workshop that’s a great starting point!
The rise of AI in today's digital landscape is a double-edged sword, presenting both opportunities and challenges in the realm of cybersecurity. With AI, you see a dynamic shift in how threats can be identified, understood, and mitigated. But it's also important to realize that this same technology can be used by cybercriminals to automate attacks, craft personalized phishing attempts (including deepfakes), and exploit system vulnerabilities.
This union of AI-driven opportunity and threat requires a balanced approach to embrace AI's potential, while keeping a keen eye on emerging risks. Here’s a quick video to help you understand AI’s impact on cybersecurity.
A few threats that AI brings to the table:
On a brighter note, AI can also be used to combat not only the cyber-attacks of today, but the AI driven challenges of tomorrow.
To harness these opportunities and manage these risks, it's important for cybersecurity professionals to stay up to date with the latest developments in AI and to engage in continuous learning and improvement.
But where do I start?, we hear you cry.
By following the previous steps in making your cyber roadmap and incident response plans, you're already 80% of the way there. On top of that solid foundation, you can build specific strategies to handle AI.
The impending changes AI brings reinforce the importance of getting the fundamentals right. A solid understanding of risk, a fully-fledged risk management plan, and an updated people strategy that creates a cybersecurity movement within an organization are foundational to preparing for new challenges - and new opportunities - that lie ahead.
People often ask, “What’s the ROI for cybersecurity initiatives?” It's difficult to answer because it's difficult to quantify something that doesn't happen - that is, a cyberattack. Security systems are like stage managers; if they do their job well, no one will ever notice them. So let's talk about the risk every company leaves themselves open to if they do not undergo cybersecurity initiatives that get their hygiene up to snuff.
If your organization, like thousands of others, doesn't have a robust internal cybersecurity team, you may need assistance from a company like Launch that provides expert cybersecurity consulting. You don't have to commit to a full transformation all at once. Common examples of cybersecurity consulting projects include:
A leading energy company sought an independent assessment of their Critical Infrastructure Protection, or CIP-010-3, processes to identify and address compliance gaps in their policies, procedures, and processes. Specifically, they required evaluations of deficiencies in change management, configuring monitoring, vulnerability assessment methodology, and handling of transient cyber assets and removable media processes.
To address these challenges, Launch delved into all North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) CIP policies associated with CIP-010-3, especially emphasizing configuration change management. Our experts provided insights on the baselining of systems, change management procedures, the annual vulnerability assessments, and new procedures for transient cyber assets and removable media.
As a result, Launch pinpointed critical areas that would be potentially problematic in an audit. Our utility client addressed these areas, minimizing the risk of non-compliance - and along the way, they fostered an enhanced compliance and cybersecurity culture in their organization.
Recognizing the importance of building up their cyber hygiene to protect themselves from future attacks, a California university hired Launch to conduct an assessment of their security and network infrastructure. Our team developed a remediation plan that would help the university improve their security posture - and just as they prepared to engage us to fix the issues we found, disaster struck. The university was hit by a ransomware attack.
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The university wasn't prepared for an attack, but thanks to the assessment, we were prepared to respond. The Launch team identified and contained the ransomware within eight hours. Working with the school's insurance company and forensic experts, we restored critical operations overnight, and full operations in under five days.
Crisis solved, Launch and the university set out to resolve the security issues we identified in the remediation plan. For instance, the school didn't have any security alerting or monitoring in place before; now, they have a SIEM solution to prevent future attacks. Together, we're managing - and improving - their ongoing security initiatives.
Want to hear more from Launch cybersecurity experts and leaders around the world? Check out our industry perspectives and thought leadership.
A few of our cybersecurity favorites:
As we move into an era of even savvier cybercriminals now augmented by AI, protecting your digital assets has never been more difficult or more critical.
Achieving sparkling cyber hygiene isn't easy, but it is simple. Follow the steps in this guide and you will build up a healthy immune system that fends off viral attacks - a security ecosystem built on trust, compliance, and resilience. With this solid base and an organization-wide cybersecurity movement, you will be ready to take advantage of the new opportunities AI offers to proactively keep your organization safe and healthy.
So, the next step is yours. How will you take your next step down the path to protecting your business without going broke? If you'd like an expert hand to help, we invite you to take a Future State of Cybersecurity Workshop. Sit down with the sharpest minds in security, cloud, and strategy for an interactive working session - and start readying yourself to race down that road.
