How Data Compliance and Cybersecurity Differ

Compliance and security are two essential factors when you run a business. Both are equally important for the seamless operation of your business. While compliance helps your business stay within the limits of industry or government regulations, security protects the integrity of your business and sensitive data.

It is worth noting that although security is a prime component of compliance, compliance does not equal security. This is because compliance does not consider the growing threat landscape and associated risks. Compliance instead assumes a set of pre-defined policies, procedures, and controls.

If an audit concludes that these pre-defined elements are adequate and your business adheres to them, everything is considered “okay” from a compliance standpoint. However, you still may not be up to scratch from a security standpoint, which only goes to show that you can be compliant but still fall short on security.

In other words, because compliance requirements take a predictable path and change slowly, the compliance landscape lags behind the rapidly changing, unpredictable security landscape.

Let’s find out how your business can benefit by combining security and compliance.

Get Covered With Security and Compliance Solutions

There are multiple security loopholes that you must proactively fix to stay out of danger. You can do it by deploying suitable security solutions. A few common security loopholes and related solutions are:

1. Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs)
   APTs across three attack pillars — endpoints, network and the cloud — are capable of paralyzing hybrid/remote/on-site work environments. Experts estimate the global APT protection market to be worth close to $6 billion in 2021 and $12 billion in 2025.¹ This statistic highlights the trouble caused by APTs. The best way to tackle it is by deploying a solution that can:

   • Offer 24/7 monitoring and threat hunting
   • Efficiently block malicious actors that evade firewalls and antivirus systems

2. Insider threats skyrocketing at alarming rates
   Over the last two years, insider incidents have increased by 47%.² What makes the scenario even worse is that insider threats are tough to detect. That’s why it is advisable to have an advanced internal threat detection solution that combines machine learning and intelligent tagging to identify anomalous activity, suspicious changes, and threats caused by misconfiguration.

3. Lack of clarity about the network
   Keeping track of all the computers, mobile phones, printers, and servers on your business’ network is challenging, especially in today’s increasingly remote-first approach to work. But without knowing the devices on your network, it is impossible to know your IT network’s health. To combat this problem, you need an automated assessment and documentation solution capable of identifying risks to all assets, including those not physically connected to the network.

4. Untrained employees and credentials getting sold on the dark web:

   • When your employees are untrained and unaware of risky actions, it could lead to severe security setbacks. For example, an employee carelessly clicking on a phishing link could lead to a full-blown ransomware attack on your business.
   • Another major security issue you may encounter is when your credentials get sold on the dark web. Experts estimate that 60% of the information on the dark web could negatively affect most businesses’ security and financials.³
   • Remember that inadequate data access protocols are a security issue and can land you in hot water with regulators, too.

Tackle all the above issues by deploying industry-best solutions for security awareness training, dark web monitoring and identity/access management.

Just like security loopholes, you must also fix compliance loopholes the moment you spot them. Non-compliance can even lead to regulators levying penalties as high as 4% of your company’s profits.⁴ Beyond financial loss, you will also have to face stakeholder dissatisfaction and a drop in market share, and this is just the start. To avoid such trouble, use a solution that automates compliance processes and generates insightful reports documenting compliance.

Convergence of Security and Compliance

Most companies have at least minimum protection, such as an antivirus on workstations/active firewalls. However, you must ensure that your business’s security posture can withstand the growing cyber threat landscape. With some effort, you can also incorporate your security solutions into your compliance strategy.

You can reduce risks by bringing security and compliance together systematically. To ramp up your organization’s security posture, you can implement strong authentication, data protection, access monitoring, network-to-edge defenses, and more. By routinely validating the effectiveness of these solutions once they’re in place, you can ensure your organization is taking the necessary measures to avoid non-compliance and security breaches.

Ready to take the next step? We can help.

Please contact us for a consultation to learn more about how we can help you combine security and compliance to prevent data compliance issues.

<sup>Sources:
1. Statista
2. 2020-Global-Cost-of-Insider-Threats-Ponemon-Report
3. CSO Online
4. GDPR Associates</sup>