Cybersecurity Landscape

For organizations in both the public and private sectors, cybersecurity is more important than ever before. And whether we like it or not, cybersecurity is not a ‘set it up and forget it’ program. It’s not something we can set up and be done with. It requires continuous monitoring, careful attention to detail constant updating and more importantly a mature Cybersecurity Risk Management Program due to the evolving landscape. Cybersecurity is truly an ongoing process that requires an always-on cybersecurity program.

In this article, we’ll explore managed security and how you can build an always-on cybersecurity program for your organization.
 

What Is Managed Cybersecurity and Why Is it Important?

Managed cybersecurity is comprised of the people, processes, and technology that are working together 24/7/365 to safeguard an organization from threats. Managed cybersecurity can either be provided internally by a team of security specialists or outsourced to a highly qualified Managed Security Services Provider (MSSP). Many companies are choosing to invest in outsourcing their security services which offers a high level of security, substantial cost savings, and the freedom to concentrate on growing their business.
 

The 4 Components of an Always-On Cybersecurity Program

It is expected that cybercrime will cost the world $10.5 trillion annually by 2025. When building an always-on cybersecurity program, here are four steps to keep in mind:
 

Tools and procedures

Vulnerabilities, alerts, and incidents will pose a risk to your organization all the time. Having the right tools in place to combat these risks is extremely important. The tools may not be able to catch everything, but a large majority of threats will be caught before they pose a significant threat to the organization.
 

People, processes, and automation

Since vulnerabilities, alerts, and incidents pose a threat to organizations, you need skilled people, processes, and automation to help remediate these vulnerabilities. Reacting to threats without a skilled workforce can bring real danger to your organization. Security professionals not only need to be trained in how to respond to threats but should have the skills to develop a cybersecurity program that matures overtime.

In terms of processes, do you have procedures in place that seek out malicious activity and abnormal behavior to detect, identify, classify, act upon and enhance your defensive capabilities? A Managed Detection and Response (MDR) service provides a turnkey solution giving organizations of every size stronger security through a scalable, cloud-based security operations center (SOC) with human-augmented machine learning along with a predictable pricing model.
 

Incident response and breach management testing

If you’re simply responding to threats as they come up, you’re not only risking the loss of vital data and slowing down or even shutting down operations, you’re also not being proactive to ensure it won’t happen in the future.

An incident response plan or breach management process minimizes the impact of a security breach, can help prevent the future of re-occurrence of an incident or a similar incident and can ultimately prevent a full-blown security breach. Make sure you’re always practicing and testing incident response plans and processes. A firefighter may not always be fighting fires; however, they’re practicing what they would do in that scenario. Cybersecurity specialists are the same way. They must practice what they would do in case of a breach.
 

Manage risk posture

Of the alerts that are coming in, some are resolved very quickly. Others require more planning and effort to remediate. Some issues can’t be solved with technology. You must manage that risk posture. Complex issues must be dealt with by the business. If an incident occurs and the business discovers that data is sensitive, how will the business move forward? How do they plan to protect it? Questions like this are all part of managing your risk posture.

With the increased sophistication and frequency of cyber threats, clients need solutions that leverage data, artificial intelligence and the cloud to even begin to properly protect their organization. That’s where BDO Digital’s new Managed Detection & Response (MDR) solution comes in. MDR provides clients with an always-on cybersecurity strategy and a technical approach to safeguard the confidentiality, integrity, availability and security of data and systems, all with the support of BDO Digital’s 24/7 security teams.

Contact us today for more information on how to develop an always-on cybersecurity program and on BDO Digital’s MDR solution.
   

---