In the 'Introduction to Cyber Security' seminar for RSM clients and contacts presented by Kaon SecurITy in early August, there were some key messages that we thought would be useful to summarise.

Cyber Security has become a hot topic over the last couple of years with the media and government making a lot more noise about it than previously.  The reason for this is that the threat landscape is changing - attacks are on the increase and no organisation in New Zealand is immune.  

The statistics presented by Kaon show that both Phishing and Ransomware attacks have dominated and attacks are unfortunately succeeding.  That means we need to be better preparaed.  Kaon highlighted the need to identify what data is valuable, where there is risk to your organisation, and then develop a plan to better protect your assets and reduce the risk of an attack causing disruption.  

Fundamentally this means concentrating on the following five areas: 

  1. Making sure that your IT Security Policies are up to date and the right fit for your organisation
  2. Improving user awareness of the current threats and how to deal with them
  3. Checking that operational security processes and procedures re robust and consistently applied
  4. Validating that technical security controls are configured accurately to protect your key assets
  5. Ensuring that objective IT auditing and continuous monitoring is conducted to check that your security posture is functioning well

 

Many attendees recognised after the seminar that their security postures were not as robust as they could be and so there is some work to be done.  Understanding exactly what to do to start improvements is not easy, please contact Kaon should you wish to receive guidance.  Kaon are accessible via their website: www.kaonsecurity.co.nz or phone (09) 570 2233