Chapter 71

Ken Brownling listened carefully as the technical expert lectured.

“Cyber threats are everywhere in today’s world. Security software is necessary to protect the business from adversaries who may have global networks.”

“How is my organization at risk?”

“One of your employees could open an attachment with a malware payload. Once opened, the attachment installs hacker tools which seize control of his laptop or phone.”

“The employee would not realize the danger?”

“Most employees are not technically aware. They are used to opening attachments from vendors with invoices or spreadsheets.”

“How does your security software help?”

“We install an agent on each employee's computer. The software agent detects hacker activity and blocks the install of known malware. Furthermore, it will send reports to the central security server of suspicious activity on the machine.”

“What about phones?”

“We can install an agent on each phone as well.”

“What is the cost?”

“Given the danger, we think the cost is reasonable to protect your organization.”

“Is the software agent your only tool?”

“No, we conduct training as well on information control.”

“What kind of information control?”

“Hackers are not the only threat. Many corporate breaches of security occur because internal employees inadvertently release sensitive information. The way to avoid internal breaches is to classify and protect data.”

“What are the classification categories?”

“Unrestricted, restricted, confidential, and strictly confidential. The data category determines how the employee is instructed to handle and disclose the data. It also determines which employees and business partners are authorized to see the data.”

“Sounds complex.”

“Yes, detailed instructions and training are necessary to ensure data is handled in a proper manner.”

“Anything else?”

“Yes. Customer contracts must also be considered. A valued customer may have a network segment dedicated to their use. The business must take care that one customer's data is not inadvertently disclosed to another customer.”

“Do you have a detailed proposal for all this?”

“Yes. A complete presentation with pricing will be available in a few days. Please review it with care. When you are ready, we are able to address your security needs.”

In their next scheduled meeting, Simon was also interested in the security proposal.

“They plan to install an agent on every machine and phone?”

“Yes.”

“That is a threat to the organization. These security people will have access to everything.”

“Not necessarily. They claim that data access is determined by the classification level. For example, only executives can see strictly confidential information.”

“I don’t believe that. The nature of security work means their software agents and analysts can see it all.”

“We can’t just refuse the entire proposal. Some level of security is necessary given the cyber threats.”

“Agreed. Before you accept their proposal, we need to encrypt all data that is critical to our colleagues.”

“I don’t have anyone with the expertise to do that.”

“We will send contractors to help you.”

“How will the new security people react when they find encrypted data?”

“Tell them it is sensitive executive data.”

“And if their software agent attempts to access it?”

“The encryption will not allow it.”

“They have encryption tools.”

“Yes, but they need cause and authorization to investigate before they can do a data discovery and unencrypt the data.”

“Such as suspicious activity?”

“We are not doing anything active with our information. It is just sitting there in an encrypted state until we access it. When we do look at it, only a few trained operatives are reviewing the data. It’s not like 500 machines in North Korea are pulling the data over the internet and attracting attention by eating up all the bandwidth.”

“I’m walking a tightrope here, trying to serve two masters.”

“We are the only master. Your service to the business is always secondary to our needs. Remember that.”

Simon updated the colleagues and asked for resources.

“How many contractors do you need?”

“Five should be sufficient to cover all the Brownling locations.”

“What about our other subject businesses?”

“As they grow, we will need to take the same precautions to encrypt our data there too. We should create a team of contractors on retainer, ready to respond when needed.”

“It will be expensive.”

“We cannot afford to have our activities or our network exposed. Given the risk level, the price is affordable.”

“Approved to proceed.”