Data Breach Response: Quick Guide
Much has been said about prevention in cyber security. Of course, prevention is better than cure but what should you do if you have been hacked? Following the recent examples of cyber attacks on Tesco and Swift, it is now clear that financial industry suffers from hackers more than others even though risk management system over the past years has really been improved.
Cyber attacks are getting so complex and multifaceted that companies’ top management should learn from the experience of other organizations who have been victims of cyber breaches of different scales. Comprehensive understanding of those attacks would definitely help to improve existing measures of cyber security.
Under the heightened security climate of today, CISOs and cyber security executives have become an essential part of board-level decisions such as application of innovative security technologies and solutions, product development and business model changes.
Companies must see cyber attacks as inevitable and even the slightest mistake can cause irreparable damage your brand reputation, reduce the trust of leadership and result in huge financial losses. The following four steps may be considerably helpful for those who want to preserve its reputation and prevent cash losses.
Immediately inform users about a breach
If your organization has suffered a cyber attack, the first step to be made is to inform you clients, customers and employees of security issues as soon as possible. Sometimes this step is hard or even impossible to take: according to the 2016 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report, law enforcement agents discover hackers’ attacks even before security teams in organizations find out that breaches have occurred and led to personally identifiable data and information theft.
Establish in your company a crisis committee which will plan the first cyber protective steps in advance. In case of cyber attack this committee can help to mitigate the effects of the attack, avoid delayed reaction, responses, distorted information and take necessary measures.
Draw up an advanced security plan
Another equally important aspect concerns a clear data breach response plan including actions to mitigate the damage. You should communicate transparently about the breach and particularly focus on the data your clients consider the most important and valuable. Decide on the most urgent steps to fix the problem and restore your clients’ trust rather than try to find out the technical details of the information compromised. To address this challenge, assign a trained forensic investigator in your response team to recover evidence and critical artifacts; understand the essence of attack and how hackers breached your corporate networks; what specific data was stolen and assess the scope of an attack.
Keep up with major cyber threats in your industry
IT security media outlets have recently conducted various surveys, at least 66% of respondents said they won’t have a deal with a company that had experienced a cyber breach. Striking examples of such cases are the US large retailers Target and HomeDepot. Well then what about small and medium-sized businesses? In recent years small and medium businesses are getting more and more attractive target for hackers that’s why every company among them must know exactly its strong and weak points in its cyber security. Current customers are intolerant to businesses who have been breached and especially small ones.
It is crucially important for IT security management to know their enemy and potential threats in the industry. For example, retailers often deal with malware attacks the aim of which is to get customers personal data; healthcare organizations are frequently victims of ransomware; as for financial industry, it may deal with various types of cyber attacks.
Now, however, there are new ideas and solutions. For example, knowledge base of threats has been created as well as modern capabilities to track attack trends such as malware strains and indicators of compromise. In 1999 the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Centre (FSISAC) was formed with its chief goal to cooperate on security strategies. There are also incentives for small financial establishments to protect against cyber threats and vulnerabilities.
Offer your customers what they need
If a data breach has already occurred, be honest and share with your clients and employees strategies and first steps to be taken. You should also draw lessons from similar situations and learn from the experience of others in order to prevent massive cyber attacks in your organization. Security attacks are inevitable: the total amount of breaches grew last year at 38% so be at the ready to help your customers and employees overcome breaches and always put the best security practices in place.
For more information about data breach response you can watch useful video by Federal Trade Commission:
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