Large enterprises to address business disruption issues

Issues which disrupt business can cause havoc for any enterprise. Whether it’s lost revenue or dissatisfied customers, the impact can be incredibly detrimental.

This is only compounded in large enterprises. Those companies that have hundreds if not thousands of employees – and subsequently customers – need to protect themselves more than most.

With reference to cyber intrusions in particular, there has been a notable shift from detecting and blocking attacks, to responding to them and dealing with the fallout. This is predominantly down to the fact that cybercrime has become infinitely more complex.

Following recent high-profile cases – the issues posed to Sony Pictures Entertainment will live long in the memory – large enterprises are not as infallible as they once were.

To that end, the latest research from Gartner has found that 40 per cent of big companies will have formal plans in place to deal with the business disruption that cyberattacks can cause.

“Servers may be taken down completely, data may be wiped and digital intellectual property may be released on the internet by attackers. These attacks may expose embarrassing internal data via social media channels – and could have a longer media cycle than a breach of credit card or personal data,” explained Gartner vice president and analyst Paul Proctor.

Enterprises will have to shift their strategic planning ideals from traditional approaches to risk, security and business continuity management.

“Security is not a technical problem, handled by technical people, buried somewhere in the IT department.