Cyber security as part of your organisation

Cyber security as part of your organisation 

For cyber security to be effective it needs to be integrated into the day-to-day operations of your organisation. It should be considered as part of the organisational strategy, making it an organisational issue and not just an IT issue. Although you will likely have a Chief Information Officer (CIO) or a Data Protection Officer (DPO) monitoring compliance, it is the responsibility of the entire organisation to ensure good cyber security practice. Having clear policies in place and providing education and training to staff will help to mitigate the risk of any attacks. 

Being Proactive 

By taking a proactive approach to cyber security, your organisation will be able to mitigate future cyberthreats or disruptions. If your plan is to react as and when a cyberattack occurs, it can often be too late. 

In order to be proactive, you should have the following things in place:

• A responsible individual within the organisation to keep track of any emerging threats in the cyber security space e.g. having an awareness of common phishing scams. 
• A process for ensuring services and software is kept up to date, mitigating the risk of bugs in software being an access point for an attack
• Staff training which is refreshed and updated regularly
• Policies ensuring only the correct people have access to data e.g. revoking access to data for employees who have left their role 

Using experts effectively

As part of being proactive, you should talk to an expert who can assist you with some of the more technical aspects of ensuring good cyber security, such as: 

• Security audit – this is a review of your organisation’s software and activities which determines the effectiveness of your controls and ensures that you are compliant with security policies. Your auditor will be able to make recommendations and help to implement any changes necessary to improve your cyber security.
• Penetration testing – this is a simulated attack. Testers will imitate an attacker and attempt to penetrate your software, which will identify any weaknesses in your security. 
• Building secure architecture – regularly consider your IT estate architecture and the security measures around it regularly, especially when implementing new tools.