With cybercrime expected “to cost the world $8 trillion USD in 2023”, it is clear that cyber-attacks are constantly on the rise, and they will continue to target organizations big and small. From your supply chain to your information technology (IT) networks, it is essential that you protect your business from the threat landscape to ensure business continuity.
To do this, companies ought to invest in their cyber risk mitigation strategies to reduce the chances of their systems being attacked and exploited. By identifying risks and developing plans that counteract them, you can enhance your company’s cybersecurity performance and safeguard your reputation.
What is risk mitigation in cybersecurity?
A component of risk management, risk mitigation is a process that seeks to reduce the likelihood, severity, and impact of a cybersecurity incident. It is a key part of any IT security strategy, providing you with risk mitigation plans that can protect company assets. The strategies you deploy must be adaptable to keep up with the latest security trends.
What types of risks can mitigation plans protect businesses from?
There are various threat actors and security risks within the IT and business worlds. By developing strategies that prioritize risk avoidance and operational safety, you can better equip your organization to deal with the following risks:
- Human error
- Data breaches
- Unsecure IT environments
- Business-crippling disasters (e.g., natural disasters)
While no business can be completely disaster-proof, risk mitigation plans can help you reduce risks that attempt to target your company—they are vital to improving your business’s security posture and preserving customer data.
6 types of risk mitigation strategies in cybersecurity
Regardless of whichever strategies you incorporate into your company’s risk reduction methods, you can have peace of mind knowing that your IT systems are better protected with solutions that cater to the requirements of you and your employees.
1. Security awareness training
Awareness training is a necessary step in building a culture of cybersecurity within your organization—a company-wide mindset that understands the dangers of potential risks and actively works to avoid them.
Ultimately, the goal of cybersecurity awareness training is to provide you and your staff with information on how to recognize various types of cybersecurity risks, how to respond to them, and how to prevent them from occurring. Security training is not a one-time event. Your entire organization should be taking training workshops consistently to make sure there are no knowledge gaps for malicious entities to take advantage of.
2. System updates
It is important to keep your IT infrastructure up to date. This includes your business’s software programs, networking solutions, and hardware devices. It is essential to have a regular maintenance schedule for your IT environment. By keeping your organization’s technological solutions updated, you will be able to routinely patch over obvious and less noticeable vulnerabilities before cyber threats can use them to access your networks.
3. Conduct risk assessments and evaluations
To create effective risk mitigation strategies, you will need to study your company’s IT solutions and business processes before analyzing them in conjunction with the threat landscape. In other words, your assessment should include:
- A list of the potential targets of a cyber-attack (e.g., data storage solutions).
- The types of external and internal cybersecurity threats your business may have to deal with, including their level of sophistication.
- The consequences of succumbing to specific security risks.
- The cybersecurity solutions you already possess.
A risk assessment offers you an overview of your cybersecurity initiatives and their efficacy in relation to organizational protection. Without an effective assessment, you will have a harder time identifying your company’s weaknesses and fixing them with the right solutions.
4. Create a disaster recovery plan
A disaster recovery plan (DRP) is a document that explains how a business will restore its IT tools in the event of a disruption. It is a fundamental aspect of business continuity plans. From migrating data to an off-site location to communication solutions that keep employees connected, having a plan in place can give you reassurance knowing that your vital network components will be able to recover from the risks of the threat landscape with as minimal consequences as possible.
5. Deploy access control measures
When malicious actors hijack legitimate user accounts, they essentially gain access to the entire network, making it easier for them to enhance vulnerabilities and risks, transfer sensitive data into their own pockets, and more.
A staple of the business world’s risk mitigation strategies, multi-factor authentication (MFA) can restrict access to your systems by requiring users to authenticate their identity with extra information. For example, a pin number. Access control measures limit who can enter your systems to authorized personnel only, helping your business avoid experiencing risks.
6. Develop an incident response plan
An incident response plan is essential to safeguarding your organization’s data. A response plan outlines how you and your team ought to respond to cybersecurity incidents with the necessary resources and procedures.
It is important to remember that digital security risks and events are constantly evolving, so you need to have processes that give your company the ability to adapt and respond to attacks quickly. An incident response plan consolidates these practices into a single space to give your organization guidance during stressful times.
Leverage risk mitigation strategies that keep the threat landscape at bay
Your business must identify and mitigate its risks before they become financial burdens. The cybersecurity experts at Everconnect in Orange County can help you secure your IT assets with cost-effective solutions, from risk monitoring to penetration testing. Reach out to Everconnect today and protect your organization from cyber threats.
