Cyber Security Assessment By Cyber Expert

 All You Need to Know About Cyber Security Assessment and Steps Involved

You must have heard about the recent highly sophisticated ‘SolarWinds hack’ impacting several government bodies and private enterprises globally. The organized attack to steal sensitive data forced even the most secured entities like Pentagon and Microsoft to accept the vulnerabilities of any IT system. Big players might have resources to mitigate the risk, but what about smaller enterprises who aren’t well prepared to face cyber attacks in real-time. Unfortunately, the only possible remedy is the regular cybersecurity assessment. It is no more just about fulfilling the regulatory compliances like HIPAA and GDPR, as your system is at the risk of losing the hard-earned credibility. The frequency and intensity of cyberattacks are increasing every day. So, your security assessment should be highly dynamic to mitigate the risk of cyber-attack and data theft.  

So, What is a Cyber Security Assessment?

No matter how advanced your security system is, cybercriminals are getting smarter to find and expose your vulnerabilities. If your company has a cybersecurity assessment system, you will be in a position to know about the effectiveness of your security controls and preparedness against known vulnerabilities. Technically, it is a part of the risk management process but cybersecurity assessment incorporates threat-based approaches to rate the cyber resilience of your enterprise. A detailed assessment report will help you know about the overall security infrastructure of your enterprise, thus giving you enough time to revamp your system to face even the most sophisticated cyber attacks in time.

Broadly, cyber risk assessment is all about identification, estimation, prioritization of risks to operations and assets so that a quick response process could be developed based on quality information. A cyber assessment professional will help you:

• Identify important information technology assets
• Know about the possible impact of a data breach due to malware, human error, or cyber attack
• Understand existing and future threats and sources of those threats to the organization
• Identify external and internal vulnerabilities
• Measure risks involved in those vulnerabilities
• Understand the chances of exploiting vulnerabilities  
• Know about the functional impact on the business when under cyber attack
• Examine existing protective system in place to mitigate a cyber attack
• Revamp regulatory compliances to cut the chances of exorbitant fines
• Know about available best defense against most sophisticated cyber attacks

The ultimate goal of cybersecurity assessment is to close vulnerability gaps and eliminate weaknesses in IT infrastructure to minimize the impact on the bottom-line. In most cases of cyber attacks, the potential of impact depends on the speed of decision making. If your cybersecurity assessment process is effective, you will have all possible IT system data available in real-time to take preventative measures in time.

To achieve these goals, a cybersecurity assessment needs to include the following information:

Cyber Security Assessment Steps 

Companies, big or small, invest billions every year to protect their IT assets from possible cyber attacks. Unfortunately, despite all, cybercriminals find ways to breach your system and steal data and this happens only because you don’t have the right set of information to strengthen your defense. The cybersecurity assessment process equips you with a highly informative report to make your system cyber attack-proof. The process starts with the assessment of inventory, then progresses to examining vulnerabilities, and ends with strategy.

Step 1: Defining Existing Security Posture

Your approach towards security is the most important factor in making your cybersecurity infrastructure robust. The IT framework comprises hardware, software, interaction points, and policies and processes to move data over the network. Your cybersecurity assessment professional will:

• Examine all possible existing protection measures built in your IT infrastructure
• Document all possible risk mitigation procedures in place

Step 2: Review Regulatory Compliances 

Depending on the area of operation, your company has to comply with one or the other regulatory requirement to protect data. Unfortunately, the majority of companies, especially startups, do not know which compliance requirements apply to them. A cybersecurity assessment pro will study your business module and prepare a complete list of mandatory regulatory compliance requirements, defining:

• Regulations applicable to your enterprise
• All possible security measure required under specific regulation
• Tools required to check compliance and reduce the chances of costly litigation and fine

Step 3: Assess the Robustness of Existing Security Tools 

Each company is unique in one way or the other thus generalized security approach doesn’t help much. A cyber risk assessment professional examines your IT infrastructure and defines the risk profile. Depending on your unique goal and industry practices, he will set acceptable risk targets. Based on risk targets, the maturity of your security protocol will be tested, thus find possible vulnerable gaps. The idea is to fill the gap between existing controls and possible risks. Everything is defined according to the established global and regional cybersecurity practices.  

Step 4: Develop a Risk Mitigation Strategy 

Cyberspace is highly dynamic, so it is not just about minimizing the risk of current cyber threats but making the system future-ready. The last step of the cybersecurity assessment is all about developing a strategy to close the gap between security preparedness and possible threats. The most important aspect involves defining action steps and resource allocation when facing a cyber-attack. Ultimately, it is all about safeguarding consumer and investor interest, so the whole assessment process remains focused on evaluating the cost of each asset. The assessment report will equip top management with quality information so that they could minimize decision-making time and the impact of a possible cyber attack.

Bottom Line

You are well aware of the challenges of cyber attacks and how it could cost you a fortune. Cybersecurity is more like a human immune system. Just like your body, your IT system also needs regular examination to know how effectively it could face cyber attacks. Knowing vulnerabilities is most important to build strong protection against the deadliest cyber attacks. It is all about having quality information to strengthen defense and decisions on time to secure your precious data.