In today's fast-paced, content-driven world, how do you implement a cybersecurity strategy? Development teams are expected to crank out apps and software at rapid speed. Consequently, cybersecurity often comes last on the list of priorities. This is a dangerous consequence as cybercrime becomes the U.S.' biggest foreign security threat. Cybersecurity teams and development teams tend to work separately, but when working collaboratively, can become a strong defense against bad actors who seek to destroy the software and apps they've worked so hard to create.
Cybersecurity Issues
Because so much of a business' focus is on content, the development team tends to significantly outnumber the cybersecurity team. Another reason that cybersecurity isn't adequately prioritized is that development teams and cybersecurity teams operate separately. Cybersecurity strategy isn't practiced by the entire team, it's more the "last stop" on the assembly line. Another factor affecting the small size of cybersecurity teams is the extreme lack of talent in the industry. These factors result in a backlog of software and apps that need to be secured.
This backlog can result in lost money and production as errors found in the integration phase are twice as costly to correct as errors found in the coding and testing phase according to the National Institute of Standards & Technology. Errors found in the post-product release phase are five times as costly to fix because of the damage to the company's reputation and disruption of business.
Proactive Cybersecurity
Practicing thorough, sound cybersecurity strategy while maintaining a fast rate of development is possible but requires a completely different approach to the development process. This means increasing the level of collaboration between the cybersecurity team and the development team so that cybersecurity is no longer the last stop on a software program's journey to being published. App security must be integrated with the development process so that the development can be aware of top priority security issues as soon as they arise, rather than finding out about them at the end of the process when there are thousands of other less important issue alerts.
When cybersecurity strategy is practiced as a discipline within a company's development process, that team becomes more prepared than ever for malicious cyberattacks. Because the development team is so heavily integrated with the cybersecurity team, they can quickly identify the effects of the cyberattack on their organization rather than sifting through an accumulation of unchecked code.
Implementing cybersecurity strategy as a discipline can extend to all employees. When you choose to set strict cybersecurity procedures, require regular training, and conduct consistent SWOT analyses and tests, you do the important, long-term work of making sure the entire staff keeps cybersecurity top of mind.
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