Dealing with a data breach or a cybersecurity threat is not an easy task. It’s a time sensitive situation that needs swift but careful actions and only a multitasker can get you out of this mess. Expect to deal with a variety of challenges in this situation such as panicked employees, complaining customers, angry stakeholders, and a long line of state and compliance regulations that you must abide by.
Regular cyber threat analysis can prevent these security breaches, data loss, and damage to the company’s public image. While preventing these attacks is crucial, there is something even more important. It's what you need to do after the security has been breached. This article discusses the essential steps you should take when the company’s cyber threat analysis detects a real risk.
Cyber Decisions are Important Business Decisions
The first step to dealing with any cyber threat is to acknowledge and understand the importance of cybersecurity and how decisions regarding it can impact the business as a whole. Before making any decision, ask yourself if it will add value to the business, what are the risks associated with it, and what is the exposure by doing this.
Don’t Panic!
Before doing anything significant, you need to calm your nerves. No good comes out of taking rash decisions with a panicked mind. The actions you take here onward will determine your company’s image in the public eye, so you need to be careful, swift, and smart.
Your actions determine how the people will see your business once the data breach becomes common knowledge. You need to make the right moves at the right time because people might forgive a cyber-attack but not a leader who has no strategy to tackle such a situation.
So, take a breath and prepare to move forward.
Communication is the Key
Once you have found out that your company is under a cyber-attack, you need to involve the relevant staff as soon as possible. Immediately inform all the related staff members such as technical teams and customer service teams that an attack has taken place.
Your technical teams will assist in locating the source of the problem and planning on what to do to resolve the issue. On the other hand, the customer service teams will be receiving hundreds of complaints over the next few days, so they need to prepare for a united front and figure out the best way to help.
Delegation Speeds Up the Process
The next crucial step is to assemble a team that can carry out the rest of the steps. Choose some of the most competent employees from your technical teams so that those who have knowledge and experience in this department can be in the frontlines.
Appoint a team leader who can overlook the entire process and keep the teams in order. Give them the responsibility to respond to the incident actively. Ensure that this team has access to all sorts of resources and that they are protected by an encryption or a VPN.
Involve Your Legal Council
Contacting your legal council is essential to work out your legal requirements. Most of the states have cyber breach legislation that requires you to inform all the stakeholders in your company and the state government in case of a security incident.
There are a lot of regulations in place depending on where you live so ask your legal council to look into the federal, state, and compliance regulations that you need to abide by at a time like this.
Hire a Data Forensics Team
One of the best things you can do under a cyber-attack is engage a forensic investigation team to help you identify the source of the attack and its cause. It’s better to hire a third-party forensics team because they will be more objective, unbiased, and professional in this situation.
What they do is determine the size, scope, and the source of the attack. The team gathers evidence regarding the attack, analyzes the collected data, and devises a solution. Most of the time, they will scan your file systems for malware to determine what kind of virus or cyber threat has afflicted your company.
Forensics can also coordinate with your legal council to advise you on the remediation steps and how to disclose the breach.
Engage the Law Enforcement
Your legal counsel would know what is the most appropriate step to take in terms of law. If they suggest, you should contact your local law enforcement agency and let them handle the situation. The earlier you report it, the more they can help you, and the faster you will be out of this predicament.
In case your local police are experienced with data breaches and cybersecurity attacks, inform your local FBI office to get their expert assistance.
Designate an Informant
During a crisis of any sort, the affected people are usually desperate for information. You need to consider designating a person from your staff to act as an informant. Their responsibility would be to stay up to date with all the latest developments and forward that information to people.
You can give out a toll number that people can call and ask for information. A common platform for information can cause a drastic reduction in stress and anxiety and you will not be clobbered with questions either.
Restrict Physical Access
While companies always assume that a cybersecurity attack must have been from a competitor or an external source, an intelligent entrepreneur would assume that the attacker could be right under the nose.
To protect your company from an insider, secure the areas that are potentially related to the attack or where you think the attack originated from. Restrict the staff’s access to those areas until the forensics team and the law enforcement agencies give you the green light.
Conduct Interviews with Employees
To figure out how the threat was detected and hear the first-hand account of people who witnessed it, you need to gather all the employees in proximity to the attack. Conduct interviews with the employees who first discovered the breach.
Collect the relevant and useful information and forward it to a common platform to be analyzed by the forensics team.
Inform The Affected Organizations
Data breaches can affect a multitude of departments. If a cyber threat has potential to harm other organizations such as your bank, financial services partners, and the credit bureaus. Let them know what has happened so that they can take the necessary precautions from their end.
Inform The Affected Individuals
Your company serves a lot of people who depend on you to keep their data safe. If such a breach has taken place that may affect other individuals, inform them and urge them to freeze their credit cards/credit records so that their data is not used fraudulently.
Damage Control
Once you have figured out the source of the attack, you need to move forwards with containing the damage. Security incidents spread like a wildfire and responding in time is the only thing that can protect your company from losing all of its precious data.
Closely monitor suspicious infiltration points to detect any further data loss or security hack. Force password resets of the users who had access to the compromised system. If the attackers used stolen login credentials it will deny them further access.
Perform system validation and testing to determine if all the systems are operational. Recertify any system that was compromised to ensure they are both operational and secure. And lastly, don’t run any important components until you are completely sure that you are in the clear.
An important advice that you should pay heed to is to never delete any data or evidence found during the investigation even if the threat has been neutralized. You never know when something like this might happen.
Take Assistance from Public Relations
Maintaining your public image during a security incident is crucial. People might not remember how well you performed when everything was working out in your favor but they will always remember how you handled a difficult situation.
- Involve your Public Relations (PR) team to devise a good plan to communicate your responses through press releases.
- Ensure that you remain transparent and composed.
- The company should have a united front no matter what is going on beneath the surface.
- Be prepared for intrusive questions from the media.
- Be straightforward and to-the-point when conveying the information.
Assess The Damage
Once the worst of the storm is over, you need to conduct a thorough assessment of the damage that the company has suffered. In order to capture the entirety of the consequences of a security attack, take a holistic approach.
Figure out the monetary repercussions of this incident, which systems you had to reinforce, and what steps you need to take now to make up for the breach of data.
Repair The Damage
Repairing the damage is a long and tedious process. You may need to reinstall some systems, restore the compromised data from backup copies, and repair/replace damaged hardware. Get your employees to work on this together and bring the company back to its former glory.
Cyber Attribution Investigation
Consider launching a cyber attribution investigation in the wake of a cyber-attack. This is the way security analysts collect evidence, connect the timelines, and strive to identify who is responsible for the breach.
Weight in the pros and cons of this investigation so that you can move ahead to place further security bars around the company.
Takeaway
What you need to take away from this incident is that preventing a disaster is substantially better than remediating it. Before your worst nightmare comes true, prepare for these threats, devise plans, and stick to these protocols in case a threat comes up. Train your employees well and always stay transparent with the public because if there is one thing that people hate more than a security breach - it’s an incompetent and dishonest company.
Consider hiring or outsourcing cybersecurity services that can protect your company’s data and keep infiltrators from stealing valuable information.
FAQs
- How can companies prevent cyber-attacks?
Companies can prevent cyber-attacks by devising a plan on how to tackle security breaches, training employees, secure networks, use antivirus software, and keep your systems updated.
- Can a firewall system protect my company from cyber threats?
Yes. Firewall systems monitor ingoing and outgoing data and keep an eye on suspicious activities. Hence, they can protect your business from malicious code.
- Where can I report cybercrime?
You can report cyber-attacks to your local police, federal government, or the state government.