Traditional cybersecurity approaches are largely at arm’s length from innovation. Instead of incorporating security into new products, services, and business activities, the conventional approach is to proactively apply cybersecurity controls in compliance with corporate security policies and standards. Under pressure to “move fast and break things,” it’s understandable why development teams sometimes lack security in the first product release. The problem with this approach is that deploying cyber controls without understanding, in detail, how a particular business activity is often left unprotected while simultaneously disrupting the smooth its operation. Cybersecurity must expand beyond its traditional responsibilities of protecting company computers to become a part of mainstream business transformation, sharing responsibility for protecting, and creating, business value. The first step is to include cybersecurity in the initial design of products, services, and other technology-driven projects.
Digital technologies are fundamentally changing how industries operate and deliver value to customers. To keep up with the disruptive forces of digital transformation, businesses must change rapidly to compete. However, these innovations introduce new cyber risks, as businesses adopt new technologies or use existing ones in new ways, creating new avenues. for cyber attacks. With the growing importance of digital innovation in business operations, products, and services, the potential risks and consequences of a successful cyber attack continue to increase, making the stakes even higher. higher than before.
To be successful, companies must ensure that their products, services, and business operations can proactively resist cyber attacks by changing the role of cybersecurity in digital innovation.
Active Fitness
When building a mountain road, builders don’t just decide to lay the road and wait for cars to fall off the cliff before implementing safety measures like guardrails. Instead, they analyze the nature of the road and its associated risks, and proactively put in place the necessary protective measures.
Similarly, in successful digital transformations such as ecommerce, banks and retailers do not implement a way to exchange sensitive information or conduct transactions, only deciding to implement protection measures after the event. hack. Instead, they identify potential risks ahead and proactively implement cybersecurity controls as a foundation to protect against them.
When designing any new product or service, it is important to know the conditions necessary for its success, safety, and scalability. In the context of a typical business transaction, such conditions may include verifying the identities of the buyer and seller, protecting confidential information, and providing proof of payment. It is possible to establish these goals in advance and anticipate any factors that may prevent them from being realized.
By clearly articulating these goals for a new business activity, one can identify and deploy the cybersecurity technologies needed to achieve these goals and effectively manage the dangers to them.
But traditional cybersecurity approaches are largely at arm’s length from innovation. Instead of incorporating security into new products, services, and business activities, the conventional approach is to proactively apply cybersecurity controls in compliance with corporate security policies and standards. Under pressure to “move fast and break things,” it’s understandable why development teams sometimes lack security in the first product release.
The problem with this approach is that deploying cyber controls without understanding, in detail, how a particular business activity is often left unprotected while simultaneously disrupting the smooth its operation. In fact, you can’t protect something if you don’t know how it works.
While cybersecurity standards and the management processes that ensure their application help maintain good cybersecurity hygiene and protect unchanging legacy business practices, they leave behind new ones. products and services that are not adequately protected and disrupted by the demands of digital transformation.
Organizations undergoing digital transformation face a dilemma: fail to implement their digital transformation strategies, which are essential for corporate sustainability, or compromise their security through exposing themselves to unknown risks beyond their control, which could lead to disastrous consequences.
To ensure that products, services, and business operations can proactively resist cyber attacks, a fundamental shift in the role of cybersecurity and its relationship with the organization is required. Cybersecurity must expand beyond its traditional responsibilities of protecting company computers to become a part of mainstream business transformation, sharing responsibility for protecting, and creating, business value.
Integrate Cybersecurity Into Design
The first step is to include cybersecurity in the initial design of products, services, and other technology-driven projects. To support the demands of traditional software development with regular release cycles, most large organizations have established formal management processes that mandate cybersecurity checks at checkpoints throughout the lifecycle. in development and in vulnerability testing after development is complete.
The problem is that security vulnerabilities discovered at these late stages of the product development cycle often send projects back to the drawing board which has the effect of slowing down the development process and putting expensive projects at risk. redesign to include security features that could have been expected as part of the initial design. By integrating cybersecurity at the design stage, organizations can avoid these shortcomings and ensure the necessary speed and agility needed to meet the demands of digital transformation.
Complementary Responsibilities
Starting the cybersecurity design process is an important step, but it also requires a significant shift in thinking about collaboration between cybersecurity and design teams. In practice, product teams focus on building great products and features and there is an understandable tendency to view cybersecurity as an obstacle to be overcome, or in some cases, avoided by completely. Meanwhile, cybersecurity teams focus on managing general risks of business computers and evaluating risks related to the end product in this context.
To successfully incorporate cybersecurity into the design of new products and services, cybersecurity and design teams must have complementary responsibilities. Cybersecurity personnel must provide advice and support on security design and architecture, which may require new capabilities and skills. It requires a culture of collaboration, service orientation, and the ability to provide design assistance in cybersecurity, as opposed to simply evaluating compliance with security standards and practices.
Product teams, on the other hand, need to articulate the requirements of their products and services in sufficient detail to facilitate collaboration with cybersecurity staff. The most challenging part of assessing the cybersecurity posture of complex systems is determining how they work and what they do. Once understood, determining the appropriate set of controls becomes straightforward.
By identifying the key elements necessary for the success of their project and the consequences of potential failures, product teams and cybersecurity partners can work together to effectively use cybersecurity technology to secure achieve business objectives.
By integrating cybersecurity as a key element of innovation and developing a shared responsibility for creating business value, companies can go beyond standard risk assessments of their computer systems and proactively ensure the stability of on their products, services, and overall business operations against potential cyber attacks. in the ever-changing landscape of digital transformation.
