That’s right. Some guy in the Chinese military, or some cybercrime hacker in the Ukraine or Tajikistan, is proactively going after your data. They want your data because they know it is valuable and can make them money. Because what they are doing is not some stunt or some one off thing to see if they can do it. They are not doing this to brag to their friends, or to post on some discussion website. Those innocent days of hacking are gone. This is their business and their livelihood and they know how to make this business pay. And pay big. Which means simply they are not going to stop.
Treat It Like A Business
You have a business also. And you need to treat your company’s Cybersecurity like an important part of your business also. It cannot be an afterthought. The alternative is not very pretty. The amount of money in Cybercrime is beyond imagination. Forbes said in 2015 it topped over $400 billion to American companies. Lloyds of London estimates by 2019 it will be $2.2 trillion! This is truly a crises situation in the making. So what do we do when a cyberattack turns into a major breach and reaches our doors? We react and we react the way anyone in an unprepared attack does. We react maybe with confusion, a little panic, misdirection until we figure it out. Reaching out for help sometimes inside but most of the time to someone on the outside. Costing lots and lots of money. But at this point cost of help is the least of your worries.
A Better Way
You should want and see results from your Cybersecurity Posture. That means fewer attacks, no major breaches, minor breaches mitigated immediately. Why not have a posture where the bad guys have to react to us? When they do attack we have a reasoned and prepared response. We have the resources in place to detect and mitigate the attack. Any contingencies for disaster recovery or cleaning up any problems will be implemented immediately. Your response to the media if necessary will be not only reasoned but will carry weight since you will be ready for that too. Don’t let some hacker determine your policy or security posture. You need to be the only one to determine that. And to do that you need to be setting this up ahead of time. It should be preventive, not reactive. Make sure your security posture can deliver results up front before an attack.