vCISO

A vCISO (virtual Chief Information Security Officer), provides cybersecurity leadership to businesses virtually at a fraction of the cost if hiring them full-time. By hiring a third-party provider to manage your cyebrsecurity program remotely, a business gains access to staff and resources that it doesn’t have in-house, and can better keep up with information security and compliance requirements.

With a vCISO you can fulfill your cybersecurity needs no different than having a General Practitioner doctor for yourself or a lawyer for your company look over your contracts.  You wouldn’t normally hire a lawyer or doctor full-time into your business so why would you hire a full-time cybersecurity professional.

Cybersecurity leadership is essential in modern business, as digital transformation increases an organization’s overall magnitude of vulnerabilities. There is an industry-wide cybersecurity skills shortage, meaning affordable skilled security leaders are hard to find. A vCISO provides a potential solution to this problem by providing access to cost-efficient security leadership on an as-needed basis.

Responsibilities

The tasks assigned to a vCISO deviates from business to business, but can do virtually all tasks that an in-house CISO can do: 

• Protecting confidentiality, integrity and availability of data in your business or your client’s businesses
• Long-term cybersecurity strategy and program development
• Policy governance, risk and compliance program framework development
• Risk assessments
• Risk management
• Security awareness training
• Developing secure business and communication practices
• Reporting on security operations
• Monitoring for critical vulnerability alerts like the Domain Controller Zerologin Vulnerability from Aug. 2020
• Defining metrics to measure program success
• Management of personnel and vendor relationships 
• Integration and management of other third-party security services

Source: TechTarget

Additional Reading: VCISO: A Pragmatic Path To Cybersecurity In Pandemic Times And Beyond

Related Terms: Risk Management

What does this mean for an SMB?

VCISOs are an excellent option for small and medium-sized businesses. With threats becoming more sophisticated by the day, it’s important to have a vCISO guide you through your security program development. VCISOs are fairly affordable, offering different payment options, outlined below:

1. Subscription/Contract
   • • Paid monthly at a fixed rate, helping whenever needed. 
2. Per-Use Basis
   • • Paid at an hourly rate, oftentimes less prioritized than the contracted customers. 
3. Hybrid
   • • Combination of Subscription and Per-Use model.
       • Ex: vCISO contractually agreed to assist business (planning, risk assessment, training, etc) up to 20 hours a month, at a fixed monthly rate. If the vCISO is needed more than 20 hours in a month they charge the business an hourly rate for the extra hours.  

Are you doing enough to protect your business?

Sign up with CyberHoot today and sleep better knowing your

employees are cyber trained and on guard!

Sign Up Today!