CORETX has released survey results suggesting that mid-sized companies aren’t adequately protecting themselves from cyber-security threats, not due to lack of investment in technology but through a lack of the dedicated, skilled resource needed to make the most of those tools.
CORETX found that of the 100 IT decision makers surveyed, 72% have implemented a Security and Information Event Management (SIEM) solution, which combines data sources and presents security related information in an accessible form. Organisations also regularly refresh other security solutions, for example firewalls, which 83% of respondents had replaced with more modern technology within the last three years.
However, only 4% had staff dedicated to monitoring, analysing and reporting security information created by a SIEM or other source and only 6% had staff dedicated to acting on security reports. With day-to-day security management falling to multi-tasking, generalist IT resources, it’s perhaps not surprising that just 19% of organisations monitor all IT logs that might contain security information. When potential threats are identified, only 13% of organisations are communicating the intelligence to someone able to deal with it. “Many organisations must be spending a lot of money on the latest technology and then failing to recruit the people they need to use it,” said Merlin Gillespie, Group Strategy Director at CORETX. “Analysing live data feeds to identify cyber-attacks is something general IT staff are unlikely to be appropriately skilled for. It’s also a relentless task. There’s a lot of data to analyse and cyber-criminals don’t respect 09:00 – 17:30 working patterns. Non-specialists may struggle to be consistently effective at the level required, which seems to be born out in our survey results.”
“Of the organisations we surveyed, 75% have recently fallen victim to a cyber-attack, with 40% occurring in the last year. It’s clear that many organisations’ security practices leave very large gaps in their protection. In our view, creating actionable intelligence on the threats organisations faces can only be handled by a dedicated team. A business can either recruit and support that function in house or outsource it, engaging a service provider that specialises in security. Whatever option is taken, the result can only be significantly more credible protection.”
