October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Throughout the month, the importance of cybersecurity takes center stage. The theme of week 4 is crucial for every business: Cybersecurity First. This isn’t a new idea: people often talk about the need to prioritize cybersecurity and take precautions before attackers strike. In response to this need, businesses invest millions of dollars in an attempt to prevent and mitigate attacks.
But simply making investments in tools and personnel is not enough. To truly put cybersecurity first, you need to know that the investments and security measures you make are effective, not just a bandaid or show of compliance. Otherwise, you run the risk of exhausting your security budget with measures that do not do enough to strengthen your readiness to prevent and respond to attacks.
So, Are You Really Making Cybersecurity a Priority?
Security is about more than having the right tools. It is about processes and people, as well as technology. Effective security requires knowing how well your technology, people, and processes are working to detect and prevent attacks. It also requires being able to identify where you can make these elements of your security program work more efficiently.
Ask the Right Questions About Your Cyber Performance
Are Your Tools Optimized to Stop Real Threats?
In terms of tools, you need to know which ones are working the way they should in order to stop cyber threats, and which tools are underperforming. You need to know how to optimize current tools to do as much as they can to protect you against real threats. And, you need to know what tools would do the most to strengthen your security posture based on your actual gaps.
Are Your Analysts Trained on the Tools They Use Every Day?
In terms of personnel, you need to know if you have the right talent. That is more than just a question of headcount. Rather, it means knowing whether your analysts can use your tools effectively. It means knowing what training will improve your analysts’ ability to face real threats. It means being able to assess whether training is actually leading to an improvement in relevant skills.
Are Your Processes Actually Leading to Improved Detection and Response?
Security also means being able to assess your processes. At the most basic level you have to know which processes are working to help your security operations center (SOC) detect threats, and which ones are not. You need to know how you can improve your processes in your SOC. And, when improving processes, you need to be able to evaluate whether the changes to processes are actually leading to improved prevention, detection, and response.
The Answers You Need
In addition to asking the right questions around your technology, processes, and personnel, you also need to be able to assess your security investments. You have a limited security budget. You need to know not only your gaps, but also where to invest and divest. You need to be able to answer, and justify in terms of dollars and cents, which changes will have the greatest impact on your security goals.
Traditional cybersecurity leaves businesses guessing at the answers to many of these critical questions. What if, instead of having to depend on that guesswork, you could instead have access to the empirical data you need to determine how each piece of your security picture contributes to your readiness to deter, detect, and respond to attacks?
Accomplish Your Mission with Data
Your security program exists to accomplish the mission of protecting your organization against an ever-changing threat landscape. In order to carry out that mission properly, you need the visibility to know what parts of your security program are supporting that mission, and what could be better. Doing this effectively requires hard, empirical data.
The SightGain Threat Exposure Management Platform is the world’s first solution that lets you continuously test your readiness to respond to cyber threats. Continuous SOC evaluation lets you perform live-fire testing against your real SOC equipment, analyze the results, identify impactful places for improvement, and assign training that addresses real identified gaps. Security stack optimization features help you make confident decisions about technology, processes, and personnel.
Prioritize Cyber Readiness
We cannot overstate the importance of cybersecurity. But it is about more than just willingness to spend on security tools and personnel. You can make the most of your security budget and put yourself in the right place to resist attacks by prioritizing cyber readiness. This means knowing what threatens your business. This means finding out what roles your technology, processes, and people are playing to combat those threats. And, this means using hard data to continuously evaluate your readiness, improve your tools and personnel, and optimize your security stack.
Is your SOC ready? See for yourself how SightGain can give you the visibility you need to know your level of readiness and make informed decisions to increase it.
