Cybersecurity Conferences

Extended detection and response (XDR) platforms automatically collect and correlate data from multiple security products from the XDR provider and select partners to provide a better security operations capability. XDR should ensure security operations efficiency with alert integration and contextualization, automation, and configuration auditing. This technology also allows for better detection, as it can combine softer signals from a variety of security products to detect security events that may have been ignored when viewed without context. 

The technology offers a solution for companies who don’t have the resourcing or skill set to integrate best of breed tools in a SIEM tool.

When organizations combine a shortage of security talent with increasing availability of XDR platforms, it shines a spotlight on the need for more automation. Security teams have been much slower than other IT teams to take advantage of automation. Security process automation means that computer security operations are handled without human intervention based on predefined rules and playbooks. These tasks can include incident response investigation remediation and recovery, information correlation, identity management activities and system hardening. All these tasks are time- and resource-intensive and prone to human error, but almost all of them are relatively easy to map into rules. The time saved with automation means that security experts can focus on more interesting and career-advancing projects, which leads to better morale and potentially more innovation.

Artificial Intelligence has been an increasingly popular venture not only in security, but across the business. While the technology, especially machine learning (ML), can help implement automation and threat detection, attackers are targeting AI solutions with bypassing techniques and using AI to improve the sophistication of attacks like phishing. Security and risk management teams should recognize that while concurrently many businesses are investing in AI to improve their operations. These new AI systems are susceptible to attacks and unconscious biases. As a result, Security and Risk management leaders are starting to take a more active role in evaluating AI systems and ensuring they are properly implemented and maintained. 

Emerging threats in the cyber physical space are changing how security and risk teams think about security. Ransomware attacks have paralyzed entire cities, hospitals, and utilities and the increasingly blurred lines between physical and digital will only increase the opportunities for these attacks. As organizations and boards recognize the potential for these attacks to paralyze the business, security and risk teams have recognized the danger created by functional silos like OT security, physical security, supply chain security and product management security. As a result we are starting to see organizations implement a new role, the CISO, who is responsible for bringing together these silos and providing a centralized view of security that goes beyond data and transaction security. 

As consumers privacy concerns increase and governments implement more regulation (i.e. GDPR, CCPA), privacy has become a stand-alone discipline with an elevated standing. Privacy officers are increasingly looking at pervasive privacy issues that affect the overall business. Privacy is no longer just a part of compliance, legal or auditing; it is becoming a discipline that must be integrated across the entire business from corporate strategy to HR to governance and procurement.