WWhat are the key cybersecurity learnings that we can take from the last year , particularly in your region ?
Perry Hutton , VP – Africa , Fortinet
The pandemic caused remote working to shift from being the exception to the norm in many workplaces . We need to understand and accept that working from home comes with massively increased cybersecurity risks , such as malware infection , unauthorised access and insecure devices . Hackers and online scammers are taking advantage of these risks and cybercrimes are accelerating at the same sort of proportions as COVID was at its peak .
Enterprises , governments , and any other organisations for that matter , have had to take steps to address the gaps in digital trust and security . We ’ ve also seen that inclusion , accessibility and the digital divide are issues which will be heightened in a post-COVID-19 scenario . This is because the negative impact of the pandemic will fall heavily on the vulnerable populations .
In the new COVID normal world , there ’ s going to be pressing reasons to accelerate connectivity and digital skills for some three-to-four million people who remain totally offline , and many of these are right here in Africa .
So , there is also a more urgent need for universal service strategies and policies to combat new forms of the digital divide .
What are the top priorities you think CIOs or CISOs should be tackling this year ?
Almost all IT professionals who we speak to believe that the risk of data breaches is far higher for remote workers and we don ’ t disagree .
This means that CISOs need to ensure they have automated protection , detection and response capabilities incorporated into their toolkits to address the risks associated with this new operating paradigm .
They ’ ll need to be more concerned with visibility and control within their
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infrastructures , including endpoints , mitigating insider threats and ensuring secure access to applications and data , regardless of whether it is on-prem or in the cloud .
We also need to consider that SD-WAN starts to play a big part in this because it goes beyond being a branch-like solution . Organisations need to adopt a Zero Trust approach to network access so they can see and control all devices and users across their entire network .
And with this proactive protection , they can ensure that their networks are secure from the latest threats . Then , to address the influx of network logs and events that go with all of this technology , they need to leverage AI-based security operations to include event correlation with SIEM and automated orchestration and response with SOAR capabilities .
Organisations need to adopt a Zero Trust approach to network access so they can see and control all devices and users across their entire network .
How important is the security of OT networks and how can CISOs factor this into their overall security strategy ?
We see OT security as such a serious concern that , from a Fortinet point of view , it is one of our core pillars of business .
The security of OT networks is a growing concern as it involves the world ’ s largest factories , utilities , healthcare , public transportation and energy facilities , all of which have seen massive transformation over the last couple of years . www . intelligentciso . com
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