While it would be nice if cybersecurity could take a temporary backseat while people and organisation figure out how to adapt to truly new working conditions, the reality is that you cant do things like rapidly shift from working from home, Dramatically increase eCommerce over brick and mortar sales, and massively scale the logistics of delivery without considering how those changes are secure along the way.
Cybersecurity is part of the pandemic response - plain and simple. In order to learn more about how security professional is dealing with this crisis, Tripwire conducted a survey between the 14th and 21st of April 2020 and received 345 responses. Many of the conclusions in the results are not surprising. For example, I don't think anyone would be surprised to know that 94% of respondents are more concerned about security now than before COVID-19.
83% reported a significant increase in employee working from home as a result of COVID-19. This is not a surprising figure and illustrates the pressures companies had to adjust to this shift. So, when we asked how prepared their security to deal with COVID-19 was, 68%mexperienced difficultly in coping. Again, no surprises to learn that organisation are most concerned about employee home network security. It's unlikely that organisation are going to start securing these home networks. It's much more likely that other concerns will come to the forefront, such as managing and securing those assets. when it comes to compliance and meeting hardening guidelines, a much higher percentage of respondents said that compliance is more difficult because of od COVID-19. Once again, visibility into remote endpoint rank at the top, in this case for compliance. Interesting, the second item is more about how to apply the policies in the new, more remote environment, rather than the actual assessment.
This is where expertise is more important than a tool.
HOW ORGANISATIONS SHOULD RESPOND TO COVID-19
The immediate response seems to be two-fold.
First, pause new projects and focus on response.
Figure out if the tools you already have can help. As a follow-up question, 92% of respondents are already thinking about the future in a COVID-19 world by identifying new tools to address the security challenges. To help with this 53% are increasing security investments - at least temporarily.
At the end of the day, we all have to figure out how to adapt to these changing working conditions. For security professionals, the good news and the bad news is the same: security isn't going anywhere.
Credits:- Paul Norris
Sr. System Engineer, Tripwire
Interesting