Why Cyber Security Needs to be on Your 2023 Roadmap 

The main reasons for investing in cyber security to safeguard your business are clear. Over the last few years, cyberattacks have unfortunately increased dramatically. Not only this, but the sophistication of attacks has also scaled.  

This is especially pertinent when it comes to ransomware attacks. The development of ‘ransomware-as-a-service’ offerings have opened this attack vector to further affiliate groups. This has resulted in ransomware being cited as the biggest online threat to consumers and businesses in the UK.  

In response to this growing threat, the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has issued specific advice for businesses to defend themselves against malware and ransomware attacks. 

On top of the rising threat of ransomware attacks, Nation State attacks have also ‘disturbingly’ increased over the last year. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has had a major impact on the cyber security landscape – or threatscape. So much so, that NCSC have offered guidance to UK organisations as the threat from Russia-Ukraine conflict remains heightened.  

The guidance urges organisations to strengthen their defences. However, despite investment in cyber security defences increasing by 60% in the past year, not all organisations have yet shored up their security posture to protect their business.  

Cyber protection challenges 

There are persistent challenges which prevent organisations from being able to protect their businesses effectively. The first challenge is a fundamental gap in cyber security skills, which sees the industry short of 3.4 million workers globally. That’s an increase of 26.2% when compared to 2021.  

Security software tooling is also very expensive. Not only that but finding the right tools, or set of tools, requires a level of cyber security knowledge which the majority of organisations don’t have in-house.  

But with 39% of UK organisations suffering a breach over the last year, rising to 59% for medium firms and 72% for large businesses, and large pools of breached credentials circulating on the dark web, action must be taken now.  

When faced with a determined adversary, or with a large and varied attack surface to defend, no organisation can be 100% breach-proof. However, all organsiations can take preventative measures to protect themselves from attack. At a more sophisticated level they can also mitigate attacks becoming serious incidents with more focus on detection and response.  

Starting the journey 

Many small businesses mistakenly hope that they are either too small to be attractive to malicious actors or that their low profile will protect them from attack. However as most small businesses will have a lack of security precaution and a lack of security expertise in-house, they are at a heightened risk of a breach.  

In fact, small businesses are often used as a penetrable backdoor to access partner ecosystems, especially where the small business works with government organisations or similar.  

There are some fundamental and affordable steps that can be taken to protect your business. The most cost effective entry point which provides you protection against a wide range of the most common cyberattacks is Cyber Essentials Plus certification. Cyber Essentials Plus is the highest level of certification under the NCSC’s scheme.  

Holding a Cyber Essentials Plus certification will protect your business against 80% of threats. On top of this, any UK business with less than £20m annual turnover that certifies their whole organisation will automatically get £25,000 cyber liability insurance cover.  

Taking a step ahead of the cyber criminals 

Businesses should be conducting regular penetration testing to identify if they have any vulnerabilities or weaknesses in their networks, systems and applications. Penetration testing can be conducted on a range of infrastructure and applications such as internal or external environments, cloud security reviews, web or mobile applications and many others.  

Penetrating testing – or ethical hacking – will show you where and how an attacker might be able to target you and breach your systems. This advanced knowledge gives you the opportnity to address any issues before the attack occurs.  

Another option for businesses that are looking to mature their approach to cyber security is ISO 27001 certification. ISO 27001 is an internationally recognised standard for information security. 

For some organisations, ISO 27001 certification is a regulatory requirement and for others, it’s mandated as part of a contractual agreement. But for all businesses, there are many benefits of ISO 27001 certification, including an initial gap analysis to understand current posture and remedy any weaknesses.  

Implementing ISO 27001 in your organisation is a large undertaking. However, with a fully managed ISO 27001 certification service, all the effort in achieving certification is taken away.  

Complete protection 

The Security Operations Centre (SOC) is the only way to focus on extended detection and response and identify and resolve a breach before it becomes a serious incident and causes damage to the business and its reputation.  

A SOC will monitor for threats and should be a key piece in any organisations cyber security strategy or roadmap. Once considered the preserve of large enterprises, it’s increasingly recommended that organisations of all sizes adopt this proactive approach to protecting their business in an age of heightened security threats.  

However, building an in-house SOC team presents challenges. Aside from the common challenges outlined above – where SOC analysts are arguably considered the hardest security specialists to come by – building a dedicated team and deploying sufficient tooling to monitor threats on a 24/7/365 basis is a huge undertaking. Costs can start from around £500,000.  

This is why many companies are choosing to outsource their Security Operations Centre service to a trusted MSSP. This opens access to the highest level of skilled security professionals. It also provides the most advanced tooling to monitor, detect and protect against cyberattacks. All for less than the cost of one security professional.  

New year, new start 

2023 brings all of us the opportunity to make resolutions to improve various aspects of our lives and our businesses. However, there are unfortunately several cyber threats that will accompany us into the new year.  

Whether you’re a small business just starting out, or a growing or established organisation that needs to advance their security protection, now is the time for a fresh look at your cyber security posture for 2023. 

If you need any advice on where to start your cyber security roadmap or what the next stage in your security roadmap should look like, please get in contact. One of our experts will be happy to guide you. 

If you discover you’ve suffered a breach and need help urgently contact us. You can call our cyber emergency line on 0800 066 4509 to speak to one of our experts.  

You can also bookmark this page in case you ever need us. Our security specialists are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.