When a student driver attends their initial driving lesson, one of the first discussions is centered around blind spots. When driving, we rely on mirrors and active awareness to monitor our surroundings, but blind spots still remain. According to the National Highway Safety Administration, there are an estimated 840,000 blind spot related accidents in the United States each year. Despite these blind spots, people continue to drive as the ability to get someplace quickly and easily fills a basic necessity.
Security Blind Sports
Blind spots are not just prevalent when driving a car. They exist across your IT estate. We know they do because regardless of how many security tools that companies deploy, data breaches still occur nearly every day. These blind spots within an enterprise are created by many factors including outdated software and systems, inadequate authentication protection, lack of employee training, cloud misconfigurations, and insufficient network and physical security measures. Despite the daily headlines about the latest data breaches affecting businesses, the race to data modernization continues, driven by the need to meet various human use cases.
Enabling Data-Driven Organizations
Navigating the digital landscape parallels driving on a busy highway: both involve inherent risks beyond our control. Just as we maneuver among fast-moving vehicles on the road, organizations manage sensitive data in an environment where threat actors constantly seek unauthorized access. Despite these evident risks, businesses are accelerating their digital transformation and leveraging AI-driven analytics to extract greater value.
A Harvard Business Review study highlights the significant advantages of AI data-driven companies over their peers across key business metrics:
- Operational efficiency: 81% vs. 58%
- Revenues: 77% vs. 61%
- Customer loyalty and retention: 77% vs. 45%
- Employee satisfaction: 68% vs. 39%
- IT cost predictability: 59% vs. 44%
Multiple studies corroborate these findings, underscoring a growing recognition of data's pivotal role in driving competitive advantage and business growth in the modern economy. However, if your business is going to continue to be driven by data, you need to know how to secure it. WEI has expertise in data modernization and cybersecurity and has identified three primary security challenges that every organization needs to overcome.
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Security Challenge #1
The first challenge is the expansive nature of the attack surface within data-driven enterprises. Data modernization often involves cloud utilization, and many companies use multiple clouds to leverage each one’s strengths. Organizations that were once accustomed to a robust security perimeter around their on-prem environment now face the daunting task of protecting a vastly larger area that cannot be secured by a mere wall. To complicate matters, different cloud vendors use varying access controls. While all major cloud providers evaluate policies to determine resource access, the specific evaluation logic and order can differ between platforms.
Security Challenge #2
The second challenge extends beyond merely protecting larger volumes of data. As data generation reaches unprecedented levels, security tools simultaneously produce overwhelming amounts of security-related metrics. IT teams find themselves drowning in telemetry data, while cybersecurity teams grapple with a deluge of alerts. This abundance of information, however, doesn't necessarily simplify tasks. In fact, it can be counterproductive as security teams must sift through vast quantities of data to identify meaningful indicators of potential attacks. This information overload can obscure critical signals, potentially delaying response times to genuine threats.
Security Challenge #3
The third challenge is the sobering reality of breach inevitability. Despite best efforts, completely preventing breaches remains an elusive goal. An attack of some type is going to happen one day and such incidents inflict both quantifiable losses and intangible damage to a business's reputation. The constant barrage of attacks breeds frustration among business leaders and security professionals alike.
Overcoming These Challenges
The persistent threat landscape of our world today necessitates a comprehensive approach encompassing robust detection, rapid response, and resilient recovery mechanisms. While preventing every zero-day attack is unrealistic, organizations can prepare effectively for inevitable incidents. Success in this environment hinges on having security professionals who can discern between relevant and irrelevant risks. It's about developing the acumen to prioritize threats and allocate resources efficiently.
At WEI, our approach to security projects begins with a deep dive into the customer's business context and objectives. By thoroughly understanding their business landscape, our security teams craft holistic cybersecurity solutions tailored to each client's unique needs. This strategy goes beyond merely implementing products or features. It is about delivering comprehensive solutions that drive tangible outcomes and align with the organization's broader goals.
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Just as a defensive driver constantly scans their environment, a security-conscious organization must maintain unwavering vigilance across its entire digital landscape. By proactively identifying and addressing known blind spots, and anticipating emerging and evolving threats, organizations can finally get a handle on protecting the data that drives their business.
If you are ready elevate your cybersecurity posture and navigate the digital landscape with greater confidence, we invite you to reach out to WEI. Let us show you how our expertise can transform your security challenges into opportunities for innovation and resilience. Contact us today to begin your journey towards a more secure and prosperous digital future.
Next Steps: In today's competitive landscape, becoming a data-driven organization is essential for understanding customer needs, driving strategic decisions, and achieving business growth. Every day, WEI helps businesses leverage advanced analytics, big data, IoT, and cloud computing to gain real-time insights and make agile decisions. This transformation enables companies to tailor their offerings, improve customer acquisition and retention, and drive profitability.
Download Transforming Into A Data-Driven Organization: The Modernization Imperative to discover:
- The definition of data modernization
- The importance of being data-driven
- The power and potential of untapped data
- Why technology should have a human element
- Three cybersecurity challenges for data modernization
