Data Breaches and their consequences Archives

Ransomware and the risk to SMEs

There’s a lot of FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt), going around about Ransomware, and it has to be said that a lot of it comes from cyber security companies. But amongst the rocks there are some very real diamonds that need the publicity. There is a very real difference between genuine information and propaganda. I hope what I do is spread information.

There is a prevailing feeling amongst small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that they are not a desirable target for Ransomware and it’s therefore not a problem for them. However, that’s simply not true and they are increasingly vulnerable to ransomware attacks, with recent trends showing a notable rise in these incidents among smaller businesses. Several factors influence the likelihood of SMEs being targeted:

Widespread Targeting: SMEs are often viewed as “soft targets” because they may lack the advanced cybersecurity defences of larger corporations. Attackers assume that smaller businesses may have fewer resources dedicated to security, making them easier to compromise.
Increasing Ransomware Attacks Overall: Ransomware attacks globally have been on the rise, and attackers have shifted their focus to include not only large enterprises but also smaller organisations across various sectors. This is often due to the lower cost of launching ransomware campaigns, allowing attackers to spread wide nets with mass phishing campaigns and automated attacks.
Financial and Operational Impact: Many SMEs are attractive to attackers because the disruption from ransomware can be financially devastating for them. SMEs may feel greater pressure to pay the ransom to restore operations quickly, fearing the loss of business or reputation if the downtime persists.
Underinvestment in Cybersecurity: SMEs often underinvest in cybersecurity due to budget constraints, lack of expertise, or other business priorities. This underinvestment can lead to outdated software, limited employee training on cybersecurity best practices, and weaker defences that attackers can exploit.

Likelihood and Statistics

High Likelihood: Studies show that more than half of SMEs have experienced a cyberattack in the last year, with ransomware being one of the most common types of attack.
Small Business Victimisation: According to a 2022 survey by the Cyber Readiness Institute, nearly 60% of small businesses were targeted by cyberattacks, and a significant portion of these involved ransomware.
Increasing Cost: For many SMEs, the average cost of a ransomware attack, including downtime, lost revenue, and recovery expenses, can be as high as £50 to a £100K, making the financial impact severe and sometimes unmanageable without external assistance.

Key Risk Factors for SMEs

Lack of Security Awareness and Training: Employees at SMEs may be less well trained on cybersecurity threats, increasing the risk of phishing and social engineering attacks that lead to ransomware.
Lack of Backup and Recovery Plans: SMEs may not have effective data backup or disaster recovery strategies, making them more susceptible to extended downtime or paying the ransom.
Weak Network and Endpoint Security: Limited resources often mean that SMEs may not have enterprise-grade firewalls, intrusion detection, or antivirus solutions, leaving systems exposed to exploitation. They also struggle with the distributed work practice (office, home etc) that has happened since COVID.
Encryption: Data is often unencrypted on end point machines.

Reducing the Risk

While the risk is high, SMEs can take measures to reduce the likelihood and impact of a ransomware attack:

Implementing Regular Backups: Ensuring data backups are frequent, secured, and tested for restoration can significantly reduce the impact of an attack.
Employee Training: Conducting regular training to recognize phishing and social engineering can help employees avoid common attack vectors.
Monitoring: No or inadequate monitoring of their data and systems, including home and other remote workers.
Endpoint and Network Security: Investing in antivirus software, firewalls, and network monitoring can improve defences.
Cyber Insurance: Purchasing cyber insurance can help mitigate financial losses associated with an attack.
Data encryption.

In summary, while SMEs face a high likelihood of ransomware attacks, increasing awareness, preparation, and proactive defence measures can substantially reduce both the risk and the impact of an attack.

What is the impact of a Ransomware Attack?

Ransomware can have devastating effects on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Here are some of the key impacts:

Financial Losses

Ransom Payment: If SMEs decide to pay the ransom (which is not generally recommended), this can result in significant, sometimes crippling, costs.
Operational Downtime: Even if no ransom is paid, businesses often experience significant downtime as they attempt to recover systems, which can halt revenue generation and lead to lost sales.
Recovery Costs: In addition to the ransom, SMEs incur expenses related to data recovery, IT support, and forensic investigation. Often, additional security solutions are needed to prevent future attacks.

Loss of Data

Data Encryption or Destruction: Ransomware can lead to the permanent loss of critical data if files are corrupted or remain encrypted after an attack.
Loss of Sensitive Information: SMEs may lose access to sensitive customer or business data, leading to gaps in operational records or strategic plans.

Reputational Damage

Loss of Customer Trust: Ransomware attacks, especially if customer data is exposed or operations are disrupted, can damage customer confidence. Many SMEs rely on personal relationships, and a ransomware incident can harm these relationships.
Brand Damage: Businesses often struggle to rebuild trust, and reputation damage may deter new clients and weaken partnerships with vendors or other business partners.

Legal and Regulatory Consequences

Compliance Violations: If SMEs operate in regulated sectors (like finance, healthcare, or legal services), a data breach can lead to violations of regulations like GDPR, resulting in fines and other penalties.
Legal Liabilities: Affected customers or vendors may pursue legal action if sensitive data is compromised, adding further financial strain.

Operational Disruptions

Halting of Services: For many SMEs, especially those without a strong IT infrastructure, ransomware can paralyse day-to-day operations.
Long Recovery Times: SMEs often lack the same level of IT resources as larger enterprises, so restoring full operational capacity after an attack can take weeks or months.

Employee Productivity and Morale

Reduced Productivity: During and after a ransomware attack, employees may be unable to work if they lack access to necessary files, email, or software.
Psychological Impact: The stress and uncertainty from a cyberattack can lead to anxiety or frustration among employees, potentially impacting morale and retention.

Increased Insurance Costs

Higher Cyber Insurance Premiums: Cyber insurance costs tend to increase significantly for companies that have experienced ransomware attacks. Additionally, insurers may demand proof of enhanced security measures to continue providing coverage.

Pressure to Strengthen Cybersecurity Measures

Increased Security Costs: Post-incident, SMEs often must invest in more robust cybersecurity infrastructure, including advanced threat detection, backup solutions, and employee training.
Ongoing Monitoring Needs: Ransomware may prompt SMEs to adopt more rigorous monitoring and endpoint protection tools, leading to continuous IT spending.

Ransomware attacks can be particularly harmful to SMEs because they often have fewer resources for cybersecurity, and a single attack can have a prolonged impact. Many SMEs lack a full-time IT staff or robust data backup protocols, which can compound the impact. Consequently, proactive measures, such as employee training, regular data backups, and up-to-date cybersecurity defences, are critical to reducing the likelihood and impact of ransomware attacks on SMEs.

What Do SME Owners and Directors Want From Cyber Security?

I wrote a post earlier this week exploring what SME owners and directors really care about when it comes to cyber security! Do they really care about the how the latest technological solutions work? Do they really care about the scare stories, or at least, do they really think that they apply to them. Oh, they might have a sneaky suspicion that it could be a problem but is it on their mind enough for them to do something about it.

The argument was made that this is especially true in an economic downturn when they are focused on costs, even more than they normally are. They want robust cyber security solutions that don’t cost an arm and a leg. And what they don’t want is jargon and tech speak that they feel is aimed at bamboozling them with science in order to convince them they should buy something that they don’t actually need.

We are believers that what is needed is simplicity. SMEs are looking for user-friendly security measures that don’t require a PhD in Cyber Science. They don’t want jargon or even industry metrics. Remember the KISS principle – Keep It Simple Stupid.

Of course they are going to have a focus, and you need to understand what is important to them and what isn’t. That will depend on the nature of their business to a great extent. Whilst there are commonalities regardless of the vertical they work in, there will always be differences, some big, some more subtle, that will impact any cyber security solutioning.

Nowadays many SMEs are increasingly aware of cybersecurity risks, but a significant number still underestimate the importance of cybersecurity risk management. SMEs often face unique challenges in this area due to limited resources, competing priorities, and often a lack of expertise not just in their organisation but also in the IT support company’s they use. Here are some insights into the current landscape:

Growing Awareness: SMEs have started to recognise that they are just as likely to be targeted by cyber threats as larger companies, partly due to high-profile ransomware attacks and data breaches affecting businesses of all sizes. As a result, awareness is rising, especially as more businesses transition to digital platforms and remote work, which increases exposure to cyber risks.

Resource Constraints: For many SMEs, the cost of robust cybersecurity measures can be prohibitive. They often lack dedicated IT and cybersecurity teams, which makes it challenging to implement and maintain comprehensive security protocols. Cybersecurity solutions can be expensive, so SMEs may prioritise short-term operational needs over what they might perceive as longer-term security investments.

Risk Perception and Underestimation: Some SMEs mistakenly believe they are too small to be targeted by cybercriminals, assuming that attackers primarily focus on large corporations. However, this “security by obscurity” mindset has been proven false, as attackers often view SMEs as easier targets due to their weaker defences.

Impact of a Breach on SMEs: Unlike larger companies, SMEs are less likely to recover from a significant cyber incident. A data breach or ransomware attack can be devastating, leading to financial losses, reputational damage, and even closure. Despite this, many SMEs may not fully understand the potential scale of these consequences.

Compliance and Regulatory Pressure: With increasing data protection regulations (e.g., GDPR, PCI), SMEs are under more pressure to adopt better cybersecurity practices to remain compliant. This has led to greater awareness among some SMEs, especially those handling sensitive data like healthcare, finance, or customer and payment information.

Cybersecurity Awareness Training and Culture: Even when SMEs implement some cybersecurity measures, they may lack the necessary employee training and risk management practices that foster a security-focused culture. Human error remains a leading cause of data breaches, so SMEs need to prioritize employee awareness and training.

In summary, while awareness of cybersecurity risk management is growing among SMEs, gaps remain, particularly around adequate investment, robust risk perception, and ongoing management of cybersecurity threats. Cybersecurity can seem overwhelming for small businesses, but as the digital landscape continues to evolve, understanding and addressing these risks is becoming essential for SME survival and growth.

Is Cyber Security about Tech or the Business?

It’s simply a fact that many owners, managers, directors etc, believe that cyber security is a technology issue and is best left to those guys in IT who understand that stuff. Here at H2 we spend a lot of time and effort trying to educate C level people, that it really is a business issue, although it has significant input from the techies. It’s a business issue because breaches can have a significant financial and reputational impact. It’s also an IT issue because it involves implementing technical measures to protect systems and data. Effective cyber security requires a collaboration between business leaders and IT professionals to address both the strategic and technical aspects of security.

The crux of the issue though, is that it must be led by the business, and at board level. It requires a strategy to be followed, which is laid down at board level and which is focused on the goals and aspirations of the business, especially when your IT is outsourced. You can outsource your IT, but you can’t outsource your responsibility.

A valid argument is that the proliferation of security tools creates an illusion of safety. Organisations, large and small, often believe that by deploying a firewall, antivirus software and maybe some other tools, such as intrusion detection systems, they are adequately protected. This ignores the fact that such tools are controls put in place to mitigate risks identified and qualified in terms of importance, in a risk assessment and unless the benefits they bring are properly identified, and the solutions placed and configured correctly, they may well not be doing what you think they are doing. This thinking can also introduce significant third-party risks into your domain. The most recent example of this is the CrowdStrike issue which caused so much chaos throughout the globe.

To be fair to most companies in the smaller and mid-market arenas, their focus is on obtaining IT solutions as cost effectively as possible, and with the minimum of support costs. Cost control is vital to most. This means that they are extremely reluctant to spend money on what they see as not being part of their core business. Of course, if they get a cyber-attack or scam, or worse a data breach attracting the attention of the ICO, then their costs trying to fix the issue can easily outstrip any costs in prevention. Unless they have a well thought out risk managed strategy, they are wide open to slick sales pitches which push products. The rub is that in order to have that well thought out strategy, it means spending on what they see as expensive services that can seem somewhat nebulous, not something they can see and feel, and there is that vague feeling that they are being led to do something that really isn’t all that important.

The approach most take is to trust their IT provider to give them the protections they need. Most of these IT providers are what is known as re-sellers, ie they sell other people’s products and will push those products because that’s their business model. What they won’t do is take a risk managed approach which is essential in ensuring that any limited spend on security, limited because of cost constraints, is targeted where it’s needed and will be most effective. In other words, the technological approach taken by most IT support company’s will do half a job at best.

In essence then, if you don’t understand the risks you face, how can ensure that your cyber security strategy and protections are fit for purpose? Risk management is all about helping us to create plans for our future in a deliberate and responsible way. This requires us to explore what could go wrong in an organisation, on a day-to-day basis.

A quote from Bruce Schneier, Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School, goes like this:

‘If you think technology can solve your security problems, then you don’t understand the problems and you don’t understand the technology’.

How do we approach this then? First and foremost, you need to identify the risks that you face. How can you identify that risk and then mitigate it? Taking risks is a part of business. You assess risk every day when doing business. Do you want to do this deal? What happens if it goes not as expected? Do I want to take this person on? Whether you formally undertake a risk assessment or whether you assess that risk informally, you are working out what is appropriate to a level that is consistent with the risk that your organisation is prepared to take. Failure to do that will almost certainly be damaging to your business, perhaps fatally so.

The difference between assessing day to day business risk and assessing risk to cyber assets, is one of understanding. What is a cyber asset? In this context insert the word ‘information’ instead of cyber. It is the information contained within the IT system that is the important asset, not the piece of hardware it is sitting on. You understand your business risk, after all it is your business, but do you understand information risk? Do you have a clear idea of what information assets you have and where they are? Before you answer that think it through. Do you really know where all the data is? OK, you know that you have a server or servers probably in a cloud somewhere (cloud storage and access is a whole other subject) and that somewhere in those servers there is a bunch of data which runs your business. How much of that data has been saved onto staff workstations when they needed it to carry out some work? How much has been copied off somewhere else for what was probably a very good reason at one point? How well is your firewall functioning? Can malware work its way onto the network because the firewall does not have Universal Threat Management installed and can therefore be probing the servers and workstations. And we haven’t even thought about changes in working patterns. How many of your staff now work remotely some or all of the time. I could go on.

How can we be sure where all this information is and how important each bit is to the business? How can we assess this risk to the business, if information is lost or otherwise compromised? What about ransomware, phishing scams etc? The good news is that some of this can now be automated and managed for you at an affordable price and you can even arrange a 14 day totally free trial to assess its effectiveness.

New Cyber Threats and Innovations

Cybersecurity is an ever-evolving field, with new threats and innovations emerging regularly. Not all these threats will apply to everyone, the trick is, and has always been, identifying the threats that apply to you, working out how vulnerable you are too those threats, and applying controls to bring those down to an acceptable level. That acceptable level will change, not just from company to company, but also asset to asset. Don’t waste valuable time and energy trying to achieve a zero-threat level. It doesn’t exist. You need to understand clearly what your appetite for risk is, ie what is an acceptable level of risk for you, and then go for it.

But what emerging threats are there that you just might have to combat in your daily business life. These trends highlight the ongoing innovation in both cyber threats and defences, driven by the growing reliance on digital infrastructure and the rapid evolution of technology.

Here are some suggestions and trends in cybersecurity as of late 2024:

1. AI-Powered Cyber Attacks and Defences

Threats: Cybercriminals are increasingly using AI to launch more sophisticated attacks, such as AI-driven phishing campaigns, automated hacking attempts, and machine learning-based malware that adapts to security measures. We’re seeing AI powered social engineering, phone calls mimicking voices of managers, and similar. Like with just about all AI usage, what it does it make things much easier by reducing human effort. So, attacks can be set up using AI and become almost fire and forget, just letting it get on with it in the background.

Defense: Organisations are countering this with AI-based threat detection systems, anomaly detection, and predictive analytics to identify potential breaches before they occur. What about your defences? Are they keeping up with these types of threat. What about mobile workforces, are your staff covered once they leave the office; do you have a hybrid or even fully remote workforce? If so, are your defences up to the job? Check out https://hah2.co.uk/

2. Ransomware Evolution

Ransomware continues to be a major threat, but it’s evolving with more advanced encryption techniques, and multi-stage attacks where attackers exfiltrate data before encrypting it. They then threaten to publish the stolen data unless a ransom is paid. I recently heard of a company that had been infiltrated through its website which was transactional, ie it sold stuff via the website and the website was connected to their database of products and sales order processing system. The web developer didn’t have sufficiently robust security in place. A good example of an SME being exploited via their supply chain.

Double extortion and Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) have become more common, where hackers sell ransomware kits to other criminals.

3. Zero Trust Architecture

Zero Trust has moved from a buzzword to a mainstream security model. Organisations are adopting a “never trust, always verify” approach, assuming that every user and device, both inside and outside the network, could be compromised.

Implementing least privilege access, micro-segmentation, and continuous authentication are key features of this approach. And no, this doesn’t have to be cost prohibitive.

4. Supply Chain Attacks

Attacks targeting third-party vendors and software providers have increased. By compromising trusted suppliers, attackers can infiltrate many organisations through a single breach.

Notable Examples: The SolarWinds and Kaseya attacks were significant instances that highlighted the dangers of such supply chain vulnerabilities. The attack on the NHS via a contracted service provider, is also a good example but it doesn’t just affect the big organisations. See above for an example of how an SME was attacked via a third-party web designer.

5. Post-Quantum Cryptography

With quantum computing on the horizon, there’s increasing focus on developing encryption algorithms that can resist quantum attacks. Post-quantum cryptography is becoming a hot topic as organisations prepare for the future of computing.

Even without quantum computing, many organisations do not use encryption, even for their critical data. If you are subject to a data breach, but that data is encrypted, you could save yourself a lot of money and reputational damage.

6. Cloud Security and Misconfiguration

As cloud adoption accelerates, the security of cloud environments remains a top concern. Misconfigured cloud settings continue to expose sensitive data, while cloud-native security solutions (e.g., CSPM, CWPP) are becoming more prevalent.

Securing multi-cloud environments and addressing shared responsibility models are critical challenges.

7. Cybersecurity for IoT and OT

The Internet of Things (IoT) and Operational Technology (OT) are becoming frequent attack targets. Securing connected devices, industrial systems, and critical infrastructure from cyber threats is a growing concern, especially as they are often lacking in adequate security protocols.

This is becoming more critical as home working becomes more and more popular. Employees connecting to your company cloud and systems using home broadband and WIFI, are also de fact connecting to any IOT devices that they are using in the home, potentially opening up back doors into your system.

8. Data Privacy Regulations and Compliance

Data privacy is a key focus as more countries introduce stricter regulations like the Data Protection Act 2018, now becoming known as UK GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation). There are other compliances such as FSA regulations and other industry bodies, that many need adherence to. Data breaches can produce fines from regulatory bodies, law suites from those affected, and quite severe reputational damage.

9. Cybersecurity Automation and SOAR

Automation is becoming critical in cybersecurity due to the sheer volume of threats. Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response (SOAR) tools help streamline incident detection and response, freeing up analysts to focus on complex tasks.

Do you have anything in place to automate your defences? Do you monitor your systems for threats?

10. Identity and Access Management (IAM)

Identity theft and credential stuffing attacks are rising, making IAM solutions more important than ever. Multi-factor authentication (MFA), password less authentication, and biometrics are seeing widespread adoption to prevent unauthorised access.

Farewell to Bob – A data protection swan song

Today is somewhat of a sad day for me as tomorrow I will attend Bob Hays funeral. Bob and I started this business when we both returned from Dubai where we worked for HPE in their cyber security business, across the Middle East. We came a long way since starting up in 2017 even though COVID happened in the middle, changing the way that business was conducted by many companies and therefore how we had to adapt and change in order to compete and provide the services needed by the new normal. I think we did a pretty good job all told.

In honour of Bob, I thought I’d focus my blog this week on data protection, his pet subject. He always went to great lengths to point out that we weren’t lawyers but were providing the how to, rather than the legal requirements of data protection legislation. He always said that lawyers were great at telling us what we need to do to meet our legal obligations but were lousy at telling us how to do it.

Data Protection, a somewhat dry subject that many companies, particularly SMEs, think they can get away from by simply paying a bit of lip service. The Data Protection Act 2018, or as it has become known, UK GDPR, is far from a toothless beast and can cause businesses to find themselves in all sorts of problems if they’re not careful.

Businesses that you might not think about, like Estate Agents, hold large amounts of personally identifiable information or PII, that is information that can identify a living individual. Not so long ago a London estate agent was fined £80,000 by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), after leaving the personal data of more than 18,000 customers exposed for almost two years.

The incident occurred when the estate agent passed the details from its own servers onto a partner company. An “Anonymous Authentication” function was not switched off, which meant there were no access restrictions to the data.

It’s surprising just how much PII estate agents hold. Just think about what they ask for when you’re buying a house. In this case the exposed details included bank statements, salary details, copies of passports, dates of birth and addresses of both tenants and landlords.

But in some cases that might not be the end of it. Individuals can sue companies that release data into the wild. In fact, there are now law firms advertising no win no fee when representing these cases. Remember that data breaches almost always involve multiple people, sometimes hundreds if not thousands of records.

One thing that many misunderstand is the link between cyber security and data protection. The Act requires personal data to be secured by ‘default and design’. This means that cyber security requirements must be designed into your data protection processes which could considerably increase the number of policies and processes you require to stay safe and within the law.

Data Protection is a bit of a bureaucratic nightmare I have to admit. Here at H2 we have a raft of templates we use, originally drafted up by Bob, that have been successfully introduced into a variety of organisations, often integrated with their company handbooks. These include:

Data Protection – Overarching Policy	Data Protection Training
Data Protection – Consent	Consent Withdrawal
Subject Access Request	Data Protection Complaints
Retention of Records	Data Breach Notification (note there is an electronic version of this on the ICO website)
Data Protection Impact Assessment Procedure	Security & Control of data protection documentation
Policy Management Review Procedure	Internal Data Protection Breach Register
Retention & Disposal of Records Register	Data Protection Officer (DPO) Responsibilities
Required records to be maintained

Of course these aren’t necessarily the only things needed, there are a whole list of cyber security policies required to complement these. Nearly all are available online, but the problem is knowing what you need and what you don’t and not just downloading, topping and tailing, and hoping for the best. That happens all too often.

Our approach to this has been refined over the years as not just the legislation evolves, both here and in Europe, but as working practices evolve alongside it. We have spent many hours researching solutions and crafting them into services that meet the requirements, which in turn have evolved into a system which works, is both affordable and appropriate for all types of business, and is accreditable to standards such as cyber essentials, if that is required. Flexibility is another key attribute that the new working practices demand. Long gone is the old bastion security system whereby everyone works within a secure boundary, protected by firewalls and other similar technologies. These days we need a system of protection that works regardless of where you are working, office, home, on the move, and can switch seamlessly between them.

When we are first approached by a prospective client and we begin our offer of a free trial to examine their requirements, one of the first things we find is that they don’t know what data they are holding, or where it all is. Oh, they have a general idea; it’s on the cloud server(s), it’s not on laptops or desktops, it’s just the stuff we need to process our clients’ requirements and yes, we’ve only got one copy. And then we install our software that first carries out a discovery exercise and we find that their laptops/desktops are holding lots of copies of the data that is on the cloud server(s). How does that happen? Over time, especially with many now employing the hybrid system of working, ie between the office and remote (home) locations, employees log on to the cloud, find they have a bit of shaky internet link and download the data they need, work on it and then upload it again, forgetting to delete it from their machine. Or they need to share it and attach it to an email and send it out, forgetting, or perhaps not realising, that the data is now stored, attached to an email, on their email server.

Then comes the issue with audit trails. If the ICO ever wanted to carry out an investigation, then having an audit trail of who created/copied/deleted/forwarded what to who, is essential. And let’s not forget the member of the public who is fully entitled to submit a Data Subject Access Request or DSAR, which demands that you reveal what data you are holding on that person. The law insists on it, and you can’t refuse it. I know of a financial firm that took nearly 3 weeks to satisfy a DSAR, taking an employee off billing, for that time.

Our solution meets the requirements needed today and not only that, has a built-in encryption system, all within the same monthly cost. It’ll cost you nothing to trial it and we’d be very surprised if once you’ve seen it and seen the ridiculously low monthly charge for the managed service, you don’t want to keep it.

So a final farewell to Bob, with thanks for all his work in the data protection arena, and for the friendship forged in 3 different company’s before we took the bull by the horns and went out on our own.

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity

I’ve made quite a bit recently about cyber resilience and the focus being placed on computer outages caused by third party suppliers, highlighted by not just the CloudStrike issue but also the ransomware attack on the UK NHS, made possible by infiltrating a key supplier. All of this of course highlights the importance of supply chain security, but my focus today will be all about disaster recovery and business continuity.

Disaster recovery and business continuity are very much connected but are different. The former is basically a plan for when things go sideways—like when a natural disaster hits, a cyberattack happens, or even if there’s a major tech failure. It’s all about making sure that businesses can bounce back and keep things running as smoothly as possible. Imagine your favourite coffee shop gets flooded. Disaster recovery is like their game plan for getting back on their feet: they might have backup equipment stored somewhere, a way to communicate with customers, and a strategy for cleaning up and reopening. In the tech world, it often involves regular backups of data, having alternate servers ready to go, and making sure everyone knows what to do in case of an emergency. The goal? To minimize downtime and get everything back to normal without too much hassle. It’s like having an insurance policy but for your operations—very important for keeping the lights on when the unexpected hits!

However, we need to understand that when it comes to the type of outages caused by supply chain cyber failures as we saw with CloudStrike, there isn’t much a customer can do to recover from that, without fixes from the suppliers. So, in this instance disaster recovery planning becomes a little difficult to say the least.

Business continuity on the other hand, is all about making sure that a company can keep running smoothly when it is deprived of their IT systems, in whole or in part. So, it’s about keeping business running whilst the disaster recovery plan kicks in and gets stuff back online. The idea is to have a plan in place that helps the business bounce back quickly. This includes figuring out which critical functions need to keep going, having some way of operating manually if necessary. Can you place an order, process an order, raise an invoice, pay a bill etc. It’s like having an emergency kit for your business—batteries included! Companies should create a business continuity plan (BCP) that outlines the steps they’ll take during a crisis. This way, they don’t just react on the fly; they can hit the ground running. It’s all about minimising downtime and keeping customers happy. In short, it’s like being prepared for a rainy day—just with more spreadsheets and meetings!

The first thing to decide is what the priorities are regarding business processes. What is essential, what is a nice to have and what you can live without in the short to medium term. Don’t leave it to managers and staff to guess, have it documented. This priority order is determined based on what is known as a business impact analysis (BIA). This determines the impact of an outage on the business and its customers. Don’t ever forget that your reputation is on the line, and you need to keep your customers serviced and happy. Each business process should have recovery time attached to it, ie how long you can do without it before it becomes truly disastrous.

It all sounds terribly complicated and therefore expensive, but in fact, it isn’t. All the information you need to work this out is already in your hands. You know your business best and you know what’s important and what isn’t quite so important. You just have probably never written it down. And that’s the crux of the matter.

Disaster recovery planning addresses the processes, technical requirements and infrastructure an organisation needs to implement to recover data and operations as required by the business in the event of a disaster. The planning process will involve identification of critical business processes, business impact analysis and thus determination of the overall requirements for a cost-effective plan.

Following the disaster recovery plan, business recovery planning is the process that organisations must use to assess appropriate timeframes for business resumption, also allowable data losses and risk tolerances for business disruptions. As stated earlier, it also needs a plan to carry on manually whilst the disaster recovery plan is implemented. Budgetary requirements for infrastructure and processes, to meet the disaster recovery plan, will also be determined by the business recovery planning process.

There are also 2 other key parts to this. Firstly, companies must ensure that their plans are tested, that everyone in the company is aware of them, where they can find them, and what their responsibilities are in this regard. Testing is critical to ensure that processes, systems and business restoration can meet the requirements laid down for them. Where the plans rely on third party service providers and/or indicate the need to support key customers, these should be involved in the testing process. This will give re-assurance that support will be received and/or given as expected.

And then we have key stakeholders. Who in your organisation is responsible for what, regarding disaster recovery and business continuity planning? Do they know their respective responsibilities, have they accepted this? Have you placed this in their job descriptions? Can they be held to this responsibility? Are they part of the planning and testing process? All seems a bit obvious when you say it, but you’ll probably not be surprised to know that it’s often totally overlooked.

Key Stakeholders	Roles and Responsibilities
CEO/Board of Directors	Aware of business continuity processes, inputs as required Approval of business continuity processes and integration with other technical functions – Note 1 Ownership of business continuity processes together with relevant business units – Note 1
Infrastructure (IT operations)	Input into business continuity processes. Consideration of any infrastructure changes which may impact security architecture. Provide inputs and coordination for systems’ resiliency testing and remediation. Provide costs/budgets for systems requirements
Business units	Creation of BIA and corresponding recovery requirements. Budgetary approval.

Note 1 – these two functions would be carried out by a CIO and/or and CISO in a larger organisation, but as most, even top end, SMBs are unlikely to have anyone in that role, then it must be owned by other board members. I hope this is helpful, but it can only be a guide and there is no one size fits all solution.

Still on the subject of Cyber Resilience………

Last week I talked about whether our ability to demonstrate resilience in the cyber field, is impacted by an over reliance on the companies who supply our IT products and services, and whether over time, that reliance has grown to the point where we are ignoring our own responsibilities in this area. I have used the phrase that you can outsource your IT, but you can’t outsource your responsibility. At the end of the day, there is only you and your employees who have the best interests of you company at heart. You wouldn’t tolerate a single point of failure in your business, you would try and ensure that there is resilience built into your business processes. Why then do we not apply that to IT?

It’s a fact, which often goes unrecognised or ignored, that cyber security is not a technical issue but a business issue, and as such much of it is reliant on policy and process. It is also a fact that your employees are both your first line of defence and potentially, your weakest link. Technology comes in in third place. The cyber mantra is People, Process, Technology. If your people don’t have at least a basic understanding of the issues involved, and you do not have the right policies and processes, rolled out to, and understood by all who need them, then all the technology in the world is likely to be a waste of money.

People

Let’s take a closer look, starting with People. Many businesses out there don’t have inhouse IT support but outsource that to an IT provider. That’s fine, you can ensure that your contract with them spells out their responsibilities regarding your security, your data. It then becomes their responsibility to ensure they protect to the standard stated in the contract, and that their people understand their responsibility. However, you still have your own staff who interact with suppliers, customers and possibly members of the public, on your behalf. I’ve discussed in my blogs before that most businesses are more likely to suffer from scams, than they are from technical hacks. Even ransomware can be considered a scam, as can most phishing attacks. The cyber-criminal is relying on someone on your staff to click a malicious link, or access something they shouldn’t, in order to facilitate the scam. Staff often make the mistake of opening malware because they didn’t know they shouldn’t, not because they are themselves malicious or lack common sense. If they fail, it’s often because they haven’t had any training. Likewise, staff can make mistakes, such as copying and releasing data to unauthorised persons, because they didn’t know they shouldn’t. So, whose failures are those, staff or managers?

Cyber Awareness Training (https://hah2.co.uk/cyber-awareness-training-smes/)

It is critical to the success of the cyber-security resilience that the organisation develops a mature culture of understanding and awareness about cyber risks. Above all this is an issue that must be driven from the top of the organisation – unless cyber-security has the full support of the Board it will be impossible to generate the level of commitment necessary to develop the culture of awareness.

Awareness and understanding of cyber risks are so important because these are the essential elements of the “human firewall” that is all that stands between the organisation’s critical IT systems and the clever social engineering tactics of sophisticated cyber-criminals. Such tactics are even more ubiquitous in our “always on” culture that is driven by the social media and applications accessed through smartphones and other mobile devices. Employees need to be aware of the cyber risks inherent in the devices that are part of their everyday lives; and of the damage to their occupation and livelihoods that can be done as a result of ignorance, carelessness or inattention in their use (and abuse) of such devices.

For the security function in an organisation, the development of a mature culture of awareness and understanding is also critical. In order to achieve the shift in thinking needed to develop the culture of awareness, four things are required:

Board and CEO Level involvement and support
Training that is relevant to the job function. Giving technical awareness training to a shop floor worker will have no impact. If lessons from the training can be taken home and used there as well, big dividends will accrue from the reinforcement provide.
Training must be fun. A little humour lightens the load and will brighten the day of employees and mean that they are more likely to remember what was taught.
Training must be continual. It is more effective to do a little training each month than to have a single long session.

Policy and Process

Moving onto to processes now. First and foremost, all companies should have a cyber security policy. It doesn’t need to be more than a page and should lay down what other polices are needed and who is responsible for producing them and keeping them in date. Any of you who have achieved an ISO certification, in whatever subject you needed to, will have had a similar process to go through and if you ever wanted to achieve ISO27001, then you would need to fully understand and comply with this.

The development and documentation of an agreed set of clear and coherent policies and supporting standards, processes and baselines are essential to the success of a cyber-security program. These must be signed off at board level and preferably set within the context of the organisations cyber-security strategy. However, the nature of the policies and supporting elements themselves will, to some extent, also be governed by the risk management controls that are needed in order to manage risk to a level that is consistent with the organisation’s assessed risk, overall risk appetite and budgetary and cost constraints. I talked about risk management last week and that can be found at https://hah2.co.uk/are-we-failing-in-our-cyber-resilience/.

The are 3 elements to this that are essential:

Policy.
Standards and processes.
Minimum baselines.

This may seem onerous and a step too far for many businesses but they are essential to ensure that you are self-reliant and resilient. The whole process need not be that difficult or expensive and it is a lot cheaper than many of the technical solutions managers jump to, without first ensuring that such technologies are actually what is required. We can offer advice and guidance in this area (https://hah2.co.uk/why-use-an-independent-board-advisor/).

Policy is the highest element in the hierarchy – representing “why” the governance controls must be used. Below this, the standards and processes represent “what” needs to be implemented, in order to deliver compliance with the policy. Thirdly, minimum baselines constitute the element that shows “how” the standards and processes should be delivered. Each of the elements is discussed in more detail below.

Technology

Finally, we come to technology. In last weeks blog (https://hah2.co.uk/are-we-failing-in-our-cyber-resilience/ ) I went into more detail about risk management and how we go about putting the right controls in the right place, to reduce our liability to the lowest level we can, without impacting operational resilience. But let’s just reiterate that many of these controls will be procedural and not necessarily technical, or they might be a mix of the two. The message is don’t get hung up on technology, approach it from a risk management point of view, treat IT and cyber security in the same way you would treat any other business process. Don’t get swamped with technical jargon, it’s not that difficult.

Next Week

Another vital piece in our resilience matrix is disaster recovery and business continuity. Not the same thing and I have already touched on this in recent articles (https://hah2.co.uk/you-can-outsource-your-it-but-you-cant-outsource-your-responsibility/), relevant to the current issues around CloudStrike. Disaster recovery is how you plan to recover from a disaster whilst business continuity is all about how you keep the business running whilst you recover your IT assets and data. It’s quite an involved subject and demands an article on its own.

Are we failing in our cyber resilience?

The fallout from the CloudStrike sensor failure, which caused severe outages throughout the globe, is still being felt and will be felt for some time to come. The emphasis has been on recovery but that will start to change, as we focus more on why it happened, and what can be done to mitigate further failures of this kind. I’ve said already, in a piece I wrote last week (https://hah2.co.uk/you-can-outsource-your-it-but-you-cant-outsource-your-responsibility/ ), that we appear to be becoming too reliant on our IT providers, particularly managed services, to ensure that we remain safe and our services can continue, and we aren’t looking too hard at ensuring resilience is built into our systems. It begs the question, is business continuity planning no longer in fashion.

Alexander Rogan of Abatis also wrote a piece that’s worth reading (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/billions-lost-chaos-lessons-from-crowdstrike-microsoft-rogan-abxde/}. In his article Alexander emphasises the importance of zero trust architecture and processes. What this essentially means is that we cannot afford to trust anyone other than ourselves. Suppliers are there to help and as such they should ensure that their own processes are robust and include thorough pre-production testing, controlled roll outs and good baseline security measures. Where CrowdStrike falls in this regard, will I’m sure, get thoroughly tested in the not too distant future.

The UK Government is also questioning the resilience of business in the UK to cyber threats (https://amp.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/jul/29/uk-desperately-exposed-to-cyber-threats-and-pandemics-says-minister), and in this case a cyber threat is not necessarily confined to security, it can also mean a crash due to a technical or process failure.

In the cyber security industry, there has long been a running war between those that sell products and those of us concerned more with services. Having been in the industry for 30 years, I have seen this time and again and the product sales nearly always win. Why? Simply because services are a hard sell with a long timeline whereas product sales are easier and quicker to achieve. Why would that be? Again, simple, people like to be able to quickly demonstrate a return on investment. They like to see a product, doing its stuff, even when often, they don’t realise how it’s doing what it’s doing, or if it’s the right product in the right place at the right time.

The risk managed approach is the way to go every time. That has not changed at all in the 30 years I’ve been plugging away at it. It’s all about People, Process and then Technology. I often quote Bruce Schneier, a US scientist on the Harvard Faculty, and a thought leader in this space. He says, ‘If you think technology can solve your security problems, then you don’t understand the problems and you don’t understand the technology’. Breaking this down, what he’s getting at is that first and foremost, you must understand the risks that you face and to do that, you have to identify your cyber assets. By that we don’t mean hardware and even software, what we are talking about is your data and the ability to keep your systems online and accessing what your staff and/or customers need to access, when they need to access it. Once you identify your assets, you then need to identify the threats to those assets and how vulnerable you are too those threats. Threat and vulnerability = risk. And by that we mean the risk to the business if it all goes pear shaped.

Once that’s done, we can then allocate a risk score to each asset with the aim of managing that risk down to an acceptable level, known as the risk appetite. That will change business to business, even asset to asset. You wouldn’t for example allocate the same level of risk [to the business], to a revenue earning system, as you would to perhaps a purely admin system that contains no personal data.

This all sounds terribly difficult and expensive, and that’s why many companies simply don’t do it, or maybe they do a subset of it. But unless you do, then it can be very difficult to know for sure that you are spending your limited budget on the right protections, in the right place. In the long run, it can save you a lot of money. This same assessment applies equally to the CrowdStrike problem, or for that matter, any other company that you have in your supply chain. You need to assess what damage they could do to you if they fail, and what you can do to mitigate that damage. It’s very well and good reaching for the nearest lawyer when it’s all gone to hell, how much better to stop it, or mitigate it, before you get there.

How Can We See a Return on Investment from our Cyber Security Spend?

How are businesses improved through good cyber security? It’s a question just about every customer, or prospective customer, of ours asks themselves. They need to see a return on investment, after all, if you don’t see anything tangible for your money, you’re unlikely to keep going down that road.

When my business partner and I set up H2 after we returned from the Middle East where we’d been working for the HP division that was busy merging itself with CSC (been there done that, didn’t fancy returning to it), the whole question of how we could offer something that gave that return on investment, occupied much of our thinking. What services could we offer at a price that businesses were prepared to pay, and what tangible benefits could we offer?

At first, we were purely a services company, proudly product agnostic, recommending the right products for the right solutions for the right customer. Not at all altruistic, but rather we felt that was the right thing to do be doing. Like many people we didn’t see COVID coming around the corner like a freight train. The pandemic didn’t just change how we would be delivering our services, it changed the whole market, it changed working practices, which are still evolving. That meant that we had to change or die. A stark choice but not one that could be avoided or put off. Like many businesses we had to reengineer the business from the ground up whilst still providing services that customers wanted and could see a need for.

An interesting google search is finding out what businesses are researching online. I was quite surprised to find that the question ‘what is a cyber-attack?’, is the most searched phrase, by a long shot. This suggests that many are still confused as to what a cyber-attack actually is. Breaking that down, its probably not all that surprising because of all the various types of cyber-attack that are constantly being rammed down peoples’ throats and I think the cyber security industry needs to take responsibility for that. There’s a big difference between education and propaganda. FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) is a common method used by many to sell security. Personally, I’m not in favour of doing that. I like to educate, not scare.

Other subjects being searched for are ransomware, phishing, spoofing, cyber threats, insider threats and cyber awareness (there are more but they’re a long way down the list).

What people want to know hasn’t changed all that much, neither has the types of threats. What has changed is how those threats present themselves, how the methodologies have changed in order to match new technologies and working practices, particularly the move to remote or home working and the additional threats that this poses. AI is making a big impact already and that impact is going to get bigger as time goes on. Email spoofing for example, that is faking an email purporting to come someone legitimate in order to get someone to take some action that is in some way fraudulent, is now being done over the phone with AI being used to fake someones voice. It’s a scary development and there are now several well reported instances of this happening in the US. If it’s happening there, it’s only a matter of time for it to happen in the UK and across Europe.

One of the first services we offered was the Cyber Maturity Assessment and our very first client took that service. Our brief was to examine their Cyber Security and Data Protection posture, including policies, processes and technical configuration and controls. They were pleased that our assessment was very comprehensive in discovering the threats and vulnerabilities to their systems and that we described them in terms of business risk. We developed comprehensive policies and processes that were all encompassing and designed to fit in with the style and presentation of their employee handbook. All good but it required us to attend their site for a couple of days which was, at one time, normal and acceptable but in terms of the ‘new normal’, not so much.

Whilst we still offer that service, remote services are much more popular and much more in keeping with how businesses are now operating. It doesn’t much matter where their staff are working, home, office or on the move. What matters is that their protections are maintained regardless.

As we developed our new offerings we researched and came up with solutions that do just that. We adopted Software as a Service (SaaS) and found some very innovative solutions that we can use to provide a managed security service to our clients at a very affordable price.

Returning to our first paragraph, how do we show a return on investment? Using our SaaS platform, we offer a 14 day free trial during which we can show a client where they currently stand and then carry out some quick remediations to show how that can be improved, so that the client can see the value of what they are going to get, using their own data. It works and I commend it to you.

Check it out – https://hah2.co.uk/

WHAT IS MANAGEMENTS ROLE IN CYBER DEFENCE?

As I move around talking to business leaders of all sizes of company, one thing stands out. And that’s that there are many different views as to how involved management needs to be in cyber defence, and some of these views are markedly different. They range from a very hands off approach, happily leaving it to their IT support, to, and it has to be said, a minority, who see it as their responsibility.

Arguably one of the most, if not the most, important roles any CEO/MD/Chairman (call him or her whatever you like and for the purposes of this article I’ll stick with CEO) is to set the importance of cyber defence in everyones mind. The tone has to come from the top to be accepted and effective. When cyber defence is clearly prioritised by the CEO and the Board, it assumes an importance in the mind of the employees. It is crucial that everyone from the CEO down understands the impact that a cyber breach, or a scam, or a cyber based fraud, can have on the bottom line.

This also aligns cyber defence and data protection with the business goals. Cyber defence is a business issue, not an IT issue. It’s crucial that all clearly understand this and how it should be woven into the very fabric of the business. The CEO and the board have a clear perspective on the company’s strategic goals and direction. By their involvement with cyber defence, they can ensure that it is aligned with the broader business strategy to fully protect the businesses data and systems. It aids with budgets for cyber security tools, training and personnel, addressing the threats to the business.

CEOS might need advice and guidance but their involvement is essential and will help to identify some issues which may not be clear to employees, especially technical employees. One such is reputational damage. The damage to a company from a data breach may not be immediately clear. But once it hits the press, or once the company becomes subject to a fine from a regulatory body such as the Information Commissioner, the word tends to spread. If you can’t be trusted to maintain a level of confidentiality, can you be trusted with other things? Doubt spreads and can destroy vendor, customer and partner relationships.

Cyber defence begins with risk management. Managing cyber risks is no different to managing any other business risk. There is no business without risk, the trick is to manage your risks down to a level that you are prepared to accept, known as the risk appetite. This must involve the CEO and directors and business managers. Each knows what could damage, perhaps catastrophically damage, their part of the business. IT staff don’t have this knowledge, their focus is often on the technical risks, not the business risks.

Risk management itself begins with a clear cyber defence and data protection strategy. Depending upon the size of your business, some elements of the suggested strategy below, may not be relevant to you. This is offered as a guide, not an absolute.

Figure 1- Suggested Cyber Strategy Framework

To help in defining your strategy, you need to undertake a risk analysis which will inform the selection, deployment and management of Appropriate, Affordable and Accreditable (if required) controls.

Appropriate in the sense that controls need to support rather than hinder business process as well as being capable of achieving their goals. Your controls also need to be appropriate to your business. Affordable may seem self-explanatory, however in the context of cyber security controls and overall budgetary constraints, return on investment is as important as cost effectiveness. Accreditation to agreed cyber security standards – of which there are many, is crucial for all organisations. Being able to provide a trail of evidence which demonstrates on going compliance to selected standards is essential in times of crisis.

Having got this far, we need a risk treatment plan to match the identified risks. What you’re trying to achieve here is to manage the risk down to an acceptable level. Don’t get bogged down in trying to eliminate risk, you won’t succeed, but rather get the risk down as low as you can. Don’t make it too complicated, identify your risks as High, Medium and Low. Then manage the high risks down to Low, followed by the medium risks. You do this by applying controls, be they procedural or technical, to the risk and measuring the outcome.

It sounds complicated and you may need guidance, but once done and adhered to, it provides peace of mind to you, that you have done what you need to do to get your Cyber Defence in place.

H2 provides affordable and flexible one-off and ongoing data protection and cyber risk protection services.

To learn more about the services we provide please click here https://www.hah2.co.uk/

Please feel free to give us a call or email.

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T: 0845 5443742

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E: kevin_hawkins@hah2.co.uk

Trust H2 – Making sure your information is secure

Data Breaches and their consequences