Cybersecurity Awareness Month – Cybersecurity Worker Shortages Abound

Cybersecurity Worker Shortages found Globally

Across the world, companies are clamoring for cybersecurity focused employees.  From analysts to vCISOs there are shortages in every area you look into.  The development of a virtual Chief Information Security Officer position is helping slowly by sharing expertise between dozens of companies no different than lawyers help dozens of companies and doctors help hundreds of patients.

Understanding that you may not be able to find a full-time CISO to work for your company means you must make due with someone part-time.  For most SMBs and MSPs, this is completely normal and sufficient.  Hire a vCISO to help you build your defense-in-depth cybersecurity program.  They help draft cybersecurity policies and procedures, they help schedule awareness training and testing, they oversee and advise on technical protections you must deploy and so much more.   Most vCISOs will help you implement the following CyberHoot best practices and in doing so, build a cyber resiliency into your company and its operations. Get started today.

CyberHoot Best practices:

1. Train your employees on the common attacks that are out there.  From weak passwords and password managers, to the importance of multi-factor authentication and how to spot phishing attacks.  Awareness is the key to defending your business.
2. Govern you employees with cybersecurity policies including Acceptable Use, Password, Information Handling and a Written Information Security Policy.
3. Establish cybersecurity best practice processes such as a Vulnerability Alert Management Process (VAMP) and a Cybersecurity Incident Management Process (CIMP) to guide and require action in the face of an emergency.  Then move on onboarding and offboarding processes, SaaS management processes, and 3rd party risk management.
4. Establish strong technical protections including: a Firewall, antivirus, anti-malware, anti-spam, multi-factor authentication on all critical accounts,  Enable full disk encryption, manage the keys carefully, and most importantly, adopt, train on and require all employees to use a Password Manager.
5. Test employees on how to spot and avoid phishing attacks.  CyberHoot has released a disruptive method of Phish Testing the fills in gaps in your employees knowledge without punishing them for failure.  Instead we reward them for success.  More info is available here.
6. Backup your data by following our 3-2-1 Backup methodology to ensure you can recover your business from a cybersecurity event.
7. In the modern Work-from-Home era, make sure you’re managing personal devices connecting to your network by validating their security (patching, antivirus, DNS protections) or prohibiting their use entirely.
8. If you haven’t had a risk assessment by a 3rd party in the last 2 years, you should have one now. Establishing a risk management framework in your organization is critical to addressing your most egregious risks with your finite time and money.
9. Buy Cyber-Insurance to protect you in a catastrophic failure situation. Cyber-Insurance is no different than Car, Fire, Flood, or Life insurance. It’s there when you need it most.

CyberHoot believes that for many small to medium sized businesses and MSPs, you can greatly improve your defenses and chances of not becoming another victim of cyberattack if you follow the advice above.