A CISO's Valentine's Day Guide to 'Role-Play'

In recent years, the role of the CISO has evolved rapidly. Management and the board not only expect CISOs to manage the company's internal risks, but also to ensure they are equipped with the right personnel and technology to support various cybersecurity initiatives.

Gartner uses three keywords to describe today's CISOs: burned out, overworked, and always-on.

▍Redefining the CISO's Role

According to a Gartner survey, 88% of board directors view cybersecurity as a business risk rather than just a technical IT issue. Thirteen percent of respondents have set up dedicated board-level cybersecurity committees overseen by a dedicated director.

Gartner predicts that by 2026, at least 50% of C-level executives will have performance requirements related to cybersecurity risk incorporated into their employment contracts.

This impacts the timeliness and quality of information risk decisions, which are increasingly being made by stakeholders outside the direct line of sight of IT or security. As formal responsibility for cyber risk shifts to the enterprise, Gartner believes the role of the cybersecurity leader must be redefined to achieve success.

"The CISO role must transition from being 'hands-on' responsible for addressing cyber risk to being responsible for ensuring that business leaders have the capabilities and knowledge needed to make informed, high-quality information risk decisions," said Sam Olyaei, Research Director at Gartner.

Gartner predicts that by 2026, 30% of large organizations will publicly share cybersecurity-focused ESG goals, up from less than 2% in 2021.

Organizations will increasingly need to demonstrate organizational commitment to reducing social issues that can arise from cybersecurity incidents, such as: data breaches of customers' personal information; potential safety issues from the use of cyber-physical systems; potential misuse and abuse in their products; and malicious cyber activity targeting critical infrastructure, among others.

In terms of specific CISO responsibilities, they are responsible for the overall security posture of the organization: managing information security, cybersecurity budgets, and risk and compliance activities, while also being responsible for explaining these complex concepts to the rest of the CXO team.

While traditional CISOs are technical influencers, modern CISOs are business influencers responsible for translating cyber risks into business risks.

We summarize the CISO's responsibilities into the following three points:

1. Security Risk and Compliance: The CISO's top priority is security risk and compliance. At the core of these responsibilities is compliance with regulations and requirements while managing security risk through proactive defense rather than simply stacking security products. Generally speaking, CISOs need to focus on three distinct areas — cybersecurity legal compliance and government regulations, cybersecurity awareness training, and security performance monitoring.

2. Technical Security Operations: The CISO is also responsible for overseeing the day-to-day technical activities of the security team, ensuring that technical security operations run smoothly and that the team has the correct tools and capabilities to do their jobs.

3. Reporting and Communicating Cybersecurity Performance to Internal Stakeholders: Senior executives and board members now have a more urgent need to understand cybersecurity initiatives. They care not only about the company's risk levels, but are also more focused on the ROI of security spending than ever before. Therefore, CISOs need to communicate security risks in business terms, propose solutions, and provide actionable insights backed by data.

Therefore, during this festival filled with pink bubbles, we still focus on the role dilemma faced by CISOs, and sincerely hope to help CISOs find the current best coping strategies. Why not start with the following three points:

▍Be prepared to respond to the "sweet" offensive of cybercrime syndicates

Be prepared for the “sweet” attack

Valentine's Day "surprises" do not have to be flowers or gifts, they can also be "romantic traps" from hackers. According to a survey, the use of the word "Valentine's Day" in malicious websites increased by 200% in February compared to any other month of the year. Similarly, malicious use of the word "chocolate" increased by 500% within the same month.

Cyber attackers excel at targeting employees and using malicious techniques such as extortion to bypass company security defenses and gain access to sensitive data.

For frequent malicious attacks such as phishing, the help that SecOps Validation can provide you is to simulate a series of network fraud attacks such as phishing emails containing malicious links or malicious attachments to verify the effectiveness of the defense system, help enterprises clarify the shortcomings of the defense system through visual reports, make corresponding adjustments and preparations, and reduce the cost spent by the security team in handling phishing emails.

▍"Wow" Management/Board of Directors

Woo your C-suites & Deepen Board Relationships

Whether you and your superiors and board are working together for the first time or are long-term partners, keeping them happy is important.

Before reporting to them, you first need to consider the type of meeting. You may face a first meeting, annual planning, or event-driven meetings, each of which requires a distinct presentation style and metrics. For example, in a first meeting, the board expects to hear an assessment of the current state of security efforts: what is working, what needs to change, what your goals are, and what support you need to accomplish them. The key is to convey that you are in control of the situation, and more importantly, to project your vision.

Secondly, you need to consider how to present the information you want to convey. It is important to understand what style of materials the board prefers, which you can gather by asking other superiors or colleagues. In terms of substantive information, you need to let the board understand the organization's cybersecurity posture, why you chose the metrics you did and what they mean to the business, and how staffing and budget affect those metrics.

In addition, you also need to learn to "threaten" the board. As a CISO, you need to keep an eye on various threat intelligence information. Bringing up threats is a great way to show that you are looking out for the company's security and to build your credibility. But you need to be able to show the board that the information is real and has a high likelihood of significantly impacting the organization.

Reporting to the board is something that requires careful preparation and practice, and has a decisive impact on your work. The SecOps Security Metric Validation Platform provides effective data and chart support for your reports through visual and quantitative reports, helping companies optimize their cybersecurity spending.

A few words are not enough to summarize. Follow the official WeChat account "SecOps Validation", reply "Board of Directors", or scan the QR code at the bottom to follow our official customer service. We have prepared a complete version of the report guide for you.

▍Show your security team love in a reasonable way

Show some love to your security teams

Today, one of the biggest challenges CISOs face is hiring and retaining the right talent in this fragile environment. With remote and hybrid work putting additional pressure on employees, company loyalty becomes invaluable. CISOs need to rethink hiring, building team knowledge bases, and conducting ongoing training. Not only that, effective ways also include reducing repetitive simple tasks, improving the ability to respond to threats, and helping team members improve their own levels through cutting-edge technical means.

CISOs are paying more attention than ever to how they communicate with employees and are investing in technology and training to enable them to do their jobs better. Crucially, they need to feel empowered, believe they can do their jobs well, and feel they are an integral part of the company's success.

1. Communication: As a CIO/CISO, you need to manage not only people, but also expectations, aspirations, and innovation, such as through frequent interactions and sharing relevant information. It is important to recognize employee apathy or burnout early and set up incentives to keep individuals and teams motivated.

2. Use cutting-edge technology: Given how quickly threat models change and evolve, the industry needs products that can get best practices, configurations, and response strategy options into the hands of security teams faster. The SecOps Security Metric Validation Platform can help your team continuously assess the defensive capabilities of critical infrastructure and application deployments, optimizing protection configurations and incident response processes.

3. Invest in training: Invest in your employees from the beginning in an ongoing way. Help your employees learn from top industry insiders. Teach your team how to fish, helping them prepare for new and constantly changing threats.