How to build digital and security resilience

Many organizations are continuing to accelerate their digital transformation agenda by leveraging innovative technology, despite the concurrent rise in cybercrime. Deloitte recently reported that “94% of chief financial officer (CFO) respondents” still plan to move their Enterprise resource planning (ERP) or financial systems to the cloud as soon as possible. Their report also asserts that over the next few years, Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) will prioritize tech adoption across the organization, with a particular focus on security (64%), privacy (59%), compliance (50%), and business efficiency and intelligence (45%).

When it comes to digital transformation (DT), cybersecurity should be weaved throughout your transformation strategy from the beginning. Here’s what companies can do to innovate safely.

How to balance digital transformation and security

With hybrid and remote working models here to stay, a marked increase in data sharing, the rapid pace of innovation, and a rise in cyber-attack sophistication, enterprise data is at greater risk of cyberattacks across a wider range of environments than ever before. Yet, with the global market growing more competitive every day, enterprises must continue innovating in order to seize new opportunities.

 

In an ecosystem that’s increasingly complex and fast-paced, how do leaders find the perfect balance between innovation and security? Our research revealed that the DT process itself can be the bridge – when you deploy secure technology solutions, such as Business Intelligence tools that support good data governance.

To fast-track the security-related aspects of your transformation, SecurityIntelligence suggests three basic steps to guide your thinking:

1.  Ensure broad risk recognition across all departments. That way, risks are less likely to slip through the cracks.

2. Include basic security hygiene, such as password management, in your security strategy. Then add in third-party or vendor management processes into your DT process later, to prevent slowing down the transformation.

3. Get the right critical skills and technology to do the job. With a limited pool of skilled individuals, companies may want to consider upskilling their current talent pool to close any skills gaps when it comes to security issues.

When a good balance is reached between innovation and cybersecurity, businesses begin to build real trust with customers by ensuring both the security of their personal information and a convenient customer experience.  In a recent World Economic Forum (WEF) article, WEF adds that “The balance of innovation, digital resilience, and the safeguard of a strong, digital defence is crucial to gaining and maintaining the trust of people and businesses across the globe.”

In fact, when it comes to a successful transformation, the role that resilience plays cannot be overstated.

Building digital and security resilience

Digital resilience is about leveraging “end-to-end, tech-driven strategies to respond rapidly to disruptive events while maintaining a firm focus on competitiveness,” WEF explains. Digitally resilient organizations open up access to new opportunities by investing more in their digital transformation. With the added innovation from emerging technologies, they can pivot quickly, capitalize on new opportunities, and remain competitive.

Forward-thinking business leaders recognize and seize these opportunities by continually steering their organizational strategy, workforce skills, and enterprise capabilities towards digital enablement.

In building up the strength of your business you’ll also need a strong focus on digital security. Cybersecurity resilience is an organization’s ability to manage and mitigate any threats to its cyber resources. This goes hand in hand with digital resilience.

According to a recent WEF whitepaper, the four main reasons cyber resilience is limited in many organizations include:

• having a narrow perspective of cyber resilience, focused mainly on security response and recovery
• lacking a common understanding of what a complete cyber-resilience capability includes
• struggling to accurately measure organizational cyber-resilience performance or communicate its true value to business leadership
• struggling to be transparent within their organization and with ecosystem partners about shortcomings in their cyber-resilience posture and their experiences with disruptive events

You can also bear these points in mind that KPMG highlights as focal points for 2022 to strengthen information security: 

1.  Shift the strategic security conversation from cost and speed to delivering effective security.

2. Ensure you have the right critical talent to achieve your security goals.

3. Build on the existing security of the cloud by automating processes. 

4. Adopt a Zero Trust policy to simplify integration and heighten security.

5. Leverage security automation to gain more business value.

6. Use a multidisciplinary approach to managing privacy risks that incorporate security and privacy by design.

7. Transform your supply chain with more automation to save time and facilitate collaboration.

8. Improve your cyber resilience with a broader, strategic approach.

A balance between security and transformational changes is possible when you have fundamental initiatives in place, such as a Zero Trust security model.

What is Zero Trust and why you need it

To manage and counteract cybersecurity risks efficiently, leading companies utilize a Zero Trust approach – a framework that “assumes a complex network’s security is always at risk to external and internal threats,” IBM describes. With this model, security measures are more on par with the needs of modern business operations.

Relying on a jumble of different security tools, and perimeter strategies like firewalls, is no longer enough – as scores of additional connections from employees’ home computers result in a broader attack surface.

And what a zero trust network does to mitigate these cybersecurity risks is:

• logging and inspecting all corporate network traffic
• limiting and controlling access to the network
• verifying and securing network resources

Basically, with this model, data is inaccessible by default – and only available to users under specific circumstances, over a limited time period. To set up this type of model, enterprises need to connect their information across every security domain.

Adopting a Zero Trust model is a practical step businesses can take toward building a security infrastructure that supports rapid transformation.

Data Governance with Astrato

Smooth digital transformation requires tools that simplify and streamline the process. Cloud-native solutions, like Astrato, connect users with up-to-date insights and harness the cloud’s inherent agility, scalability, and cost saving.

For an effective DT, it’s vital that data is not siloed off in various departments. With Astrato, you connect directly to your data in the cloud, and our writeback capabilities establish a single source of truth for the whole business. Your data is secure, compliant and governed because there is no data movement or replication. Perfect for organizations moving to the cloud.

 

Astrato supports world-class data governance with Enterprise Authentication, plus security measures such as integrating Snowflake’s built-in Row-Level and Data Masking security policies to manage and secure access control. As a data leader, you can deliver a seamless user experience and easily manage access to your data.

 

Digital transformation is more than an exercise in updating software and skills. It’s about building trust between employees and the technology they use to do better and be better every day. Help make their journey into the digital future a smooth one with intuitive solutions that reduce the complexities of change.

Explore Astrato’s intuitive analytics solution today.

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