How Cyber Resilient are we?

CIO Academy Asia and its partner, Fortinet – conducted a series of Cybersecurity roundtable discussions
between the month of August and November 2016. A select group of CIOs and CISOs were brought
together in each of the 5 (five) key cities in SEA, to discuss some best practices and to address different
challenges faced by the organisations in their effort to embrace Cyber-resilience in this inter-connected
digital world. This report summarises the key issues discussed during all the sessions:
Discussions Summary
Changing But Persistent Face of Uncertainty
Remarking on the timeliness of the roundtable as we are now operating in a disruptive age, it was noted that
security has become almost synonymous with disruption. As a broad expression of uncertainty, it remains
valid as an underlying and necessarily persistent consideration as people see technologies threatening to
disrupt jobs and lives.
Such uncertainty applies even despite current enthusiasms for disruptive developments like driverless
vehicles, as recent traffic accidents involving such vehicles have led to reviews of their mode of operations.
They serve to remind that disruptive tech also go through the hype cycle.
Likewise with social media, it was relatively recent that such technologies have matured and become
powerful tools for digital marketing. Some among the audience were not even on Facebook until a few years
ago, but its use has since become pervasive even in the public sector. Such changes in usage of new
technological media reflect the times and are also necessitated by having to keep up with the millennials but
the fundamentals have not changed i.e. cybersecurity has been an issue from the very beginning.
Polling Cybersecurity Concerns of the C-Suite
Four points were highlighted as underlying why cybersecurity is more important than ever, and which serve
as useful ground-level context for framing the roundtable discussions, namely:
• Technology platforms like Uber, AirBnB, Grab and other unicorns are now bigger and more attractive and
are larger cyberattack targets, the attack exposure is much wider!
• The number of IP devices have grown by leaps and bounds, while the volumes and value of data has also
multiplied exponentially,
• Today all devices highly interconnected on the internet or otherwise , and
• Perpetrators of cybersecurity risks and threats have become ever more sophisticated than they have ever
been before. The attackers are more well organised than the ones defending.
Cyber resilience as a topic has often been covered with different definitions, but the definition proposed by
the Scottish government was raised for consideration i.e. that cyber resilience is the ability to prepare for,
withstand, rapidly recover and learn from deliberate attacks or accidental events in the online world.
2016 CYBERSECURITY ROUNDTABLE SERIES
Resilience Through Systematic Readiness
In line with global trends, the Internet of Things is presenting real
and present cybersecurity threats, such that traditional mitigation
approaches are no longer good enough, it was shared how 4 key
thrusts compared against Gartner’s approach i.e. Predictive,
Preventative, Detective, and Responsiveness/Corrective, and how
these mapped to their mandate for driving initiatives.
Furthermore, responsive and mitigating actions are undertaken
with digital forensics and data analytics; measures served to enable
their national cybersecurity crisis management.

Moving With the Times
On the private sector front, McKinsey has remarked how tightly technology and security have become integrated
with business processes. This was compared with the situation about 15 years ago when cybersecurity was still
seen as a nice-to-have, when IP security did not even exist in some organisations or was parked under the purview
of IT infrastructure to handle low level security issues. Security was not seen to be a business issue and threats in
those times were also relatively amateurish. The picture now is vastly different, with state-level attacks as detailed
in Project CameraShy and coordinated attacks such as those on Sony as detailed in the Project Blockbuster report.
As the threat landscape changed, the notion of resilience has also changed – when enterprises used to worry about
viruses and malware, today they are facing threats that could bring down entire organisations. Even the lines
between cybercrime and cybersecurity incidents are blurring, and attackers are largely motivated by gain.
Disrupting the Disrupters
The interest now is not simply in having the capabilities to respond to cyberattacks but also to actively disrupt and
dismantle attacks. This can be through internal partnerships with departments that share the interest in
preventing recurrence of such cyber incidents, as well through external partnerships with the public sector and law
enforcement agencies to ensure thoroughness in the common approach to shared cyber threats. IT was repeatedly
mentioned that the value and importance of public-private collaborations and acknowledged that such approaches
may not be accessible for SMEs, there are strong bases for active dialogue within and across the industry on such
matters.
Broadening Defensive Approaches
He commented that while defence in depth has looked at security from an end-to-end perspective, there still needs
to be greater breadth through cross-unit collaborations, because security is increasingly recognised to be a business
issue as well. As such, organisations’ IT units may know how to respond to cybersecurity incidents but business and
other corporate units should also understand their roles and appropriate responses on their part e.g. how to work
with service providers, understand the legal implications and communicate with external parties etc.
Security incident management has likewise also evolved – from IT-driven perspectives e.g. ITIL security
management to an enterprise view involving different aspects of business and corporate dimensions. The business
continuity programme will also need to take into account cyber threats and not just focus on the physical
dimensions e.g. disruptions to supply chain. Where required by regulation such as in the financial sector, banks are
also required to conduct regular cyber readiness tests where they are assessed on how well they collaborate in the
event of attacks.
Between Internal and External Threats
It was also noted that much of the attention on cybersecurity has tended to focus on external threats but reminded
that internal security threats e.g. due to intentional misuse or sheer human errors also merit attention, not least
from the perspective of balancing security spends and investments. Attention must also be drawn to the spectre of
invisible threats due to infiltration of trusted third parties with direct connectivity to systems, which enable
attackers to gain a foothold and access to the actual intended targets. The example of JP Morgan being attacked
through their IT asset management system and the First Bank of Taiwan’ ordeal that came about through the
compromise of their London office’s IVR systems.
As such, organisation leaders’ should not only redefine how they view invisible threats but also rethink their
approaches to risk assessments and business impact analyses by taking into account threats that lie beyond the
organisation’s immediate environment.

With regards to industry competition, we should question the use of broad benchmarks and instead organisations
should be guided by clear understanding of how their risk profiles and context stand and differ from their
competition.
Smarter Use of Resources
The value of security analytics platforms provide valuable context and which derive intelligence from not only big
data but also user activity logs, VPN and HR logs, video and CCTV feeds which can provide better insights into threat
profiles. With better understanding and insights, organisations can better respond and lower their turnaround
time from security incidents, allowing them to better focus attention and the efforts of scarce personnel.
Organisational structure and adequate budgets for security may also have a role in how well they respond to
cybersecurity threats but he stressed the greater importance of assigning clear roles and responsibilities, building a
good culture that is supported by relevant KPIs, and having clear contextual understanding to determine what
security investments to spend on. Ultimately, it would serve resource-crunched organisations to embrace
managed or cloud security services and to better focus on people development and upskilling.
As such, it would be good to advocate for creating greater awareness from the top i.e. for those who are in the
position to make decisions to be intelligence-led rather than reactionary to the latest threat incident. Beyond
awareness and intelligence, there are challenges for the security industry in hiring not only the right skills or
experience profile but also the right qualities e.g. stamina for handling high stress levels and self-motivation among
security response staff, or engineers for the analytics team who can apply the right perspectives and approaches to
the job. Ultimately, cyber resilience is a state of mind that encompasses Patience, Anticipation, Discipline, Stamina,
Respect and Defence; this is especially so as recent security exploits have tended to target humans as the weak link.
Contextualizing & Incentivising Security Strategies
It might well be true that IT security leaders do not take heed and transform themselves from being simply
technologists to ‘business technologists’. Security resilience is all about contextualizing of security strategies based
on sound understanding of the business and industry, and mapping it across their security requirements.
Threats are constantly evolving with responsive measures seem to be readily countered by attackers, hence their
interest in ways to respond. From the public sector perspective, there were also concerns over the unpredictability
of internal threats and thus the interest in consistent and effective security education and awareness building. How
internal awareness is conducted could also be important, ranging from passive (e.g. information sharing on
screensavers or posters) to more active (e.g. in-person sessions and outreach to top management and the Board)
measures.
Attune According to Risk Profile
On regulatory and standard-driven strategies, the
example from the banking sector abiding by regulations
is important, it should not be a one-size-fits-all
approach i.e. central banks have different mandates
and risk profiles compared to retail or commercial
banks.
As such, it would be wiser to apply an intelligence-
driven approach which goes beyond technical threat
intelligence to encompass collective and business
intelligence e.g. having awareness of the wider
implications of organisational M&A activities or large
investments and how they might present risks of cyber
threats, or the possibility of geopolitical threats.

Taking Care of External Facing End Points
An aspect of internal threat is the use of shadow IT by business units who may run external-facing applications
without the IT department’s awareness, or lack of uniformity in security procedures for separate networks e.g.
corporate versus factory systems. Security concerns over legacy systems and devices likewise play into this vein in
terms of touchpoints with customers and processes for data assurance; this poses as one of the greatest challenges
to IT security governance which in turn illustrates a lack of end-to-end or thorough security awareness among
business units. Some ways to counteract this can include pegging of security education, awareness and compliance
to the organisational culture and propensity for learning e.g. tests of how staff can be influenced to respond or not
respond to social engineering, and how vigilant they remain in the face of less obvious risks.
The Value of Collective Intelligence
It is also useful to collate the attributes and characteristics of actual or attempted cyberattacks because they
provide insights into areas of vulnerability that can be redressed. As such, the ultimate goal in cybersecurity
defence is to make every attempted attack as painful, difficult and expensive as possible, as a way to discourage
attackers from persisting. Collaborations within an industry, threat signatures and shared intelligence on attack
attributes can be useful as evidence and help improve vigilance and resilience for industry members as a whole. In
terms of public-private partnerships, the sharing of intelligence can be crucial because a security incident could be
a prelude to a much larger broad-based cyberattack.
Higher education institutions and universities could initiate sharing of intelligence among themselves without
waiting for the government to sanction or make the first move. However attendees expressed reservations
because such moves will require knowledge of priority areas, guidance and adequate confidence that decisions
taken will not have negative or unforeseen consequences. To that end, awareness building among institutions
could help them better calibrate what they should or could effectively do.
Taking the Initiative on Collaboration Initiatives
On possible guidelines or rulebooks for different industries to catalyse collaboration in cybersecurity, CyberThreat
Alliance can systematically share threat intelligence with industry competitors, government agencies, the FBI,
Interpol and other state agencies to better serve end-users. The collaboration has yielded a substantive body of
threat information that is beneficial for all parties, and serve to improve the organisation’s solution offerings in the
security space.
By extension, attendees were encouraged to consider the power of such initiatives if separate institutions or
agencies took up the gauntlet and made the first move. If industries led the way then they would find support from
the government. By illustration, Bank Negara and StanChart recently signed an MOU to strategically collaborate,
share security insights and foster evidence exchange to improve advanced cyber forensic analyses in the financial
sector. A further aim was to build capacity and eventually certify 10,000 IT professionals with cybersecurity
credentials - measures that were observed to be relevant and useful for the private sector industries to emulate.
Business-First Security Education
There was a need for cybersecurity education to look in totality beyond the technology or technical infrastructure.
A business-centric perspective to education, starting with the IT leaders own transformation from technologist to
business technologists. Security leaders need to assume a business hat not least because IT security systems
depend on the business side of organisations to drive their value proposition; as such, IT security professionals
need to understand business workflows, the core value proposition of the organisation, and the types of likely
exposures to cyberattacks encountered in the course of conducting business.

Doing so will also allow better prediction, management, decision-making and more effective response to security
incidents. It will also better focus the attention of security resources and talent to address the most relevant or
important aspects during a security incident. Organisations should select security technologies based on a strong
understanding of their specific contextual needs, and question if certain threats are likely or relevant to the nature
of their business.
Know Thyself (and What Motivates Your Potential Attackers)
Less can be more in terms of choice of security technologies, its better to maximise the use of a suite of
technologies that are designed to work together rather than invest in different best-of-class security technologies
that may not be as well integrated to work together.
Organisations’ decisions on security spend should as such be guided by good understanding of their value
proposition, the core nature of the business and whom might be likely or interested parties to perpetrate
cyberattacks. It is also important to know the touchpoints or access points for the business’ core value assets from
an information standpoint and how the applications or devices may impact security.
From this perspective, IT leaders will be able to more clearly communicate the possible security impacts of various
business initiatives to top management which may not be see or realise the wider implications. As such, the
security purview of IT leaders serves as another layer of due diligence from a security standpoint.
Organisations also need to do a better job of educating their personnel to understand what are the organisation’s
crown jewels or core assets to be handled carefully. Organisations could also do more to collaborate and build
trust – starting with measures at the individual level, with careful management of expectations if collaborations are
to grow and develop organically.
A concern related to the use of third parties for address a business’s cybersecurity needs i.e. where a business is
dependent on outsourcing, who would regulate these third parties. A suggestion was to have a clear view of the
business benefits and risks at the point of procurement, and possibly consider the appropriateness of cyber
insurance. Decision points hinged on business needs and the value to be derived e.g. outsourcing to transfer
certain kinds of risks or solve a resource or manpower issue. As such, organisations need to be aware of what
trade-offs they are making between different kinds of risks.
It was recommended that
organisations map their business
critical assets to identify what
are areas that merit focus and
security spend. Business critical
assets may be seen in terms of
their short term ability to drive
profit or revenue such as
customer databases, or a core
business value such as IP and
product design. As one way to
guide decisions on what are too
critical to outsource, vendors
should also be able to
adequately spell out what they
would do under various threat or
cyberattack scenarios.

Manila, Philippines
31 August 2016, Shangri-La at the Fort Manila
Jakarta, Indonesia
6 October 2016, Raffles Jakarta

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
21 October 2016, Nobu Kuala Lumpur
Singapore
27 October 2016, The St. Regis Singapore

Hong Kong
11 November 2016, W Hong Kong
©2016. CIO Academy Asia. All rights reserved.
Neither this publication nor any part of it may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of CIO Academy Asia.
CIO Academy Asia would like to sincerely thank Fortinet for the collaboration and partnership in
this cybersecurity roundtable series.
*More photos of the event can be found at CIO Academy Asia’s Facebook Page:
facebook.com/cioacademyasia
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