As we start Q3 2022, it’s a good time to look at what are the trends we’re seeing in cybersecurity for the rest of 2022 across the industry.
Insights from Thomas Allen, Principal Consultant / Information Security Officer at Foresite Cybersecurity – C|CISO, CRISC, CCSP, ISO 27001 LA, CISA, CISSP, HCISPP, GCCC, GCFA
On the human side of cybersecurity in 2022
It is not surprising that the data indicates a few common threads from past years. We know the old saying, “Why do people rob banks? Because that is where the money is.” Why is phishing still considered the biggest threat vector? Because it works.
The Verizon Data Breach Report shows that some form of “hacking the human” or social engineering was part of 82% of breaches and 60% of the time this included email subterfuge. This shows that despite the industry’s efforts, security awareness is not hitting the mark.
Progressive organizations are moving beyond outdated compliance-based awareness campaigns and investing in holistic behavior and culture change programs designed to provoke more secure ways of working. A culture change that makes cybersecurity awareness a company-wide responsibility helps to promote good cyber behavior.
On remote work
This brings up another trend: remote workers. Currently, 60% of knowledge workers are remote and at least 18% will not return to the office. These changes in the way we work, together with greater use of public cloud, highly connected supply chains, and use of cyber-physical systems have exposed new and challenging attack “surfaces.” This leaves organizations more vulnerable to attack. Security leaders need to look beyond traditional approaches to security monitoring, detection, and response to manage a wider set of risks.
On supply chain risks
Supply chain attacks are racing up the statistics, especially attacks to systems. Gartner predicts that by 2025, 45% of organizations worldwide will have experienced attacks on their software supply chains — a three-fold increase from 2021. Organizations need to really review and put their suppliers to the test, especially suppliers with a high-risk level of access to our systems or data. Organizations should look to implement a Zero Trust model that minimizes privileged access to critical assets through supply chains.
On the changing nature of cybersecurity in 2022
Another huge trend is the move to a more agile and flexible approach to cybersecurity. While change control and deliberate decision making have their place, because the threat landscape changes so fast, cybersecurity professionals need the ability to act fast and not get bogged down in process. The old thought process of getting many approvals and performing many tests before making a change needs to shift to the DevSecOps idea of “if we break it, we will fix it, but let us secure it first and fast.” To counter-act potential errors in agile deployments, organizations can implement risk management and continuous monitoring, this helps provide ongoing visibility into potential misconfigurations or errors during DevSecOps processes.
