Our connected business world means there are thousands of entry points in and out of companies. The exploding number of access points means we now have thousands of potential openings into our companies. What has been traditionally seen as a simple component of an organization’s infrastructure, throwing a firewall and antivirus solution down as an adequate cyber strategy, has evolved into something that can keep one awake at night. The scary truth is that network security does not work as well as we thought.
As cybersecurity has emerged as the number one priority today, it is becoming a front business issue and a board room issue. After a series of high profile data breaches and warnings, corporate boards find themselves dealing with cyber threats and security issues. Not long ago, cybersecurity was a term rarely, if ever, heard in the boardroom. Rather, information security was deemed to be a risk managed solely by the chief information or technology officer or the IT department. Those days are gone. With the long list of high profile cybersecurity hacks and the after effects that include drop in shareholder value, decline in sales, brand and customer erosion, regulatory inquiries and litigations, cybersecurity has become an increasingly challenging risk that boards must address.