GUEST RESEARCH – At the same time, business leaders are under pressure to keep up with digital transformation and adopt new technologies – they must be faster, smarter and more reliable. The security of these systems poses a myriad of questions to boards across the country, regardless of industry. Beyond deciding on the most effective, secure systems for your business, challenges of energy and space efficiency, as well as available skills and training make this a turbulent time.
This is why cyber security stands firm as a pillar of maintaining business resilience. As new technologies continue to reshape the modern business landscape, Chief Information Offices (CIOs) across Australia are laying a firm foundation, listing cyber security as a key priority as we head into 2025.
The evolution of business resilience
The notion of going offline is simply unacceptable in today’s digital world. In view of this, ADAPT recently surveyed (CIOs) about their strategies for ensuring continued business resilience[1]. The research found that while business resilience itself hasn’t changed, the factors that drive it have evolved considerably.
Business resilience encompasses several aspects: cyber security, adaptability and the capacity to manage significant changes. It measures how effectively an organisation can adapt to and recover from crises or changes.
The landscape has shifted from simply ensuring continuity in the event of a crisis, to more comprehensive cyber resilience and adaptability. In Australia, extreme weather events and recent global outages have rendered entire networks, and consequently operations, offline.
In fact, there were more than 500 notifiable data breaches reported to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner in the first six months of 2024. In addition, the average cost of a data breach in 2024 is USD $4.88 million (AUD $7.288 million) – and this is just the financial cost, not to mention reputational damage.
With this in mind, how can cyber security measures ensure greater standards of business resilience?
- Technology modernisation
The majority of Australian CIOs are planning to upgrade their network or cloud infrastructure within the next 12 months, according to ADAPT’s research. This is indicated by their spending intentions, with almost six in 10 CIOs planning to invest in modernising legacy infrastructure in the next financial year. The research also shows that Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) in particular are prioritising the safeguarding of data and cyber resilience as primary goals.
As a result, the rise of cloud computing and advancements in virtualisation have revolutionised how businesses approach IT infrastructure. Enter, hybrid cloud, which integrates on-premises, private cloud and public cloud resources into a unified infrastructure. This offers flexibility, scalability and cost efficiency.
In a hybrid world, where data flows seamlessly across on-premises and cloud environments, prioritising cyber security is essential to safeguarding information and ensuring continuity in the face of evolving threats. That’s why business resilience is inextricably linked to cyber security, especially as organisations shift to hybrid infrastructures in a bid to simplify technology.
- Effective resilience
When it comes to security, resilience is about maintaining confidentiality and availability. However, as organisations adopt hybrid environments, they often face uncertainties about the location of their servers and the activities of third parties within their ecosystems. This is why it’s important not to put all your resources in one place with a single vendor.
Hybrid cloud allows organisations to spread resources across multiple locations and vendors. This strategic distribution enhances resilience against disruptions, including vendor-specific failures, and helps ensure smooth operations during unforeseen challenges.
- Proactive measures
As organisations increasingly rely on a mix of on-premises and cloud-based systems, a proactive approach has never been more important. It’s essential to anticipate challenges and address them before they escalate, rather than reacting after the fact. This can be the difference between operational continuity and costly disruptions.
Seamless integration and comprehensive visibility enable businesses to detect and respond to threats more effectively, reducing the risk of breaches and ensuring that operations remain uninterrupted.
This is especially true in the context of hybrid infrastructures, where the interplay between various systems can create potential security gaps.
The future outlook
It’s clear that developing cyber resilience is top of mind for CIOs. By prioritising and establishing cyber security measures, and taking a proactive stance, organisations are well positioned to navigate the complexities of today’s digital environment and protect against the ever-growing array of cyber threats.
http://itwire.com/security/why-cyber-security-is-a-key-pillar-of-business-resilience.html