Compliance and Cyber-security

Navigating requirements, frameworks, and solutions

Understanding cybersecurity compliance

Cybersecurity tasks aren’t always so neat and tidy. Everything that is done should, ideally, ladder up to a larger effort to reduce the threat surface and secure an organization—but who determines what those efforts should be? What does “good” cybersecurity look like, and who checks on it? Who ensures that’s it up to date and evolving as threats change?

The less-than-exciting answer is, often, “auditors.” Auditors from various regulatory bodies, governments, or other institutions get the final say on whether an organization’s cybersecurity efforts are compliant with best practices, laws, and regulations.

To that end, the cybersecurity to-do list becomes even more complex, incorporating concerns about technologies, policies, and practices to ensure compliance. Yet the elephant in the room is that compliance is hard. It’s stressful, time-consuming, and often confusing—kind of like cybersecurity itself can be.

Compliance often gets treated as a check-the-box activity—but because it’s taking something inherently subjective and trying to fit it into that neat checkbox, there’s a lot of room for interpretation. That can lead to headaches and frustration, or worse, regulatory penalties and other major challenges.

The good news is that, by treating cybersecurity compliance as not only critical to business but a strategic element of normal operations, you can take proactive steps to improve both your protection and your regulatory standing to confidently check compliance tasks off your to-do list.

Why is compliance important?

Compliance is a bit like the carrot and stick: regulatory authorities reward compliant organizations by recognizing their efforts and punish noncompliant organizations with fines or legal action. At its core, then, compliance matters because staying compliant ensures an organization can keep operating—for regulatory compliance frameworks—or is following the guidance of external experts to operate safely and protect intellectual property, employees, and/or customers.

But in the context of cybersecurity, compliance is particularly important to:

Protect sensitive data
Meet legal requirements
Maintain customer trust
Enhance an organization’s overall security posture
Access cyber insurance

If there’s a common theme here, it’s risk reduction. Cyber insurance and an improved security posture reduce risks for organizations, and the legal requirements and protections protect their customers. In fact, reducing risk and preventing harm are central concepts to most regulations and controls.

The consequences of noncompliance

Noncompliance leads to more than just increased risk, though. Organizations found to be noncompliant with regulatory compliance frameworks are subject to enforcement from various governing bodies, and may face fines, legal action, and in extreme cases may be shut down. In a more abstract sense, noncompliance can damage an organization’s reputation, making it harder to attain or retain customers.

To put this in perspective, consider the European Union’s General Data Protection Requirement (GDPR). While the GDPR may not have immediate cybersecurity implications, it’s a great example of how information technology (IT) and the digital world collide with the real world. The GDPR was created to protect fundamental rights and freedoms related to personal data, and authorities have numerous enforcement tools at their disposal. The regulation grants authorities the ability to fine noncompliant organizations up to USD$21 million, or four percent of their annual worldwide revenue from the prior fiscal year, whichever is higher.

While these are some of the most severe enforcement actions, reserved for high-profile, large-scale cases, they serve as a reminder of how compliance can affect day-to-day business in big ways.

Key cybersecurity frameworks and regulations

Now that we have a baseline understanding of cybersecurity compliance, we can explore some of the key regulations, frameworks, and standards that may apply. The regulations and frameworks listed below are not exhaustive, but are some of the most referenced in the cybersecurity industry due to their IT and data management implications.

The Healthcare Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)

Established in 1996, HIPAA is a United States Act of Congress that modernized the flow of healthcare information. HIPAA stipulates how personally identifiable information (PII) maintained by the healthcare and health insurance industries should be protected from fraud and theft. The act applies to most individuals and organizations that use and/or access the Protected Health Information (PHI) of patients treated inside the USA, regardless of citizenship.

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS)

First released in 2004, the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is a set of technical and operational requirements designed to protect credit card data from theft and misuse. Prior to PCI DSS, each major credit card issuer (e.g., American Express, Visa, etc.) had its own security rules for vendors who stored, processed, or transmitted cardholder data. PCI DSS unified and strengthened these baselines to address increasingly sophisticated cyber threats.

The NIST Cybersecurity Framework (CSF)

NIST’s Cybersecurity Framework (NIST CSF) is one of the most widely recognized cybersecurity frameworks and aims to provide organizations—regardless of size, risk exposure, or cybersecurity sophistication—with a set of best practices, standards, and guidelines for managing and reducing cybersecurity risks.

ISO 27001

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) sets the international standard for information security through ISO 27001. ISO 27001 outlines and defines what an effective information security management system (ISMS) looks like. It is a risk-based standard designed to work for organizations of all sizes.

The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP)

Established in 2011, the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) is a US government initiative to provide a standardized approach for monitoring, authorizing, and conducting security assessments on cloud products and services.

Common compliance requirements

Here are some requirements commonly found in regulations and frameworks:

Information access controls: These controls can be addressed via policies as well as technologies that can monitor, identify, alert on, and even block unauthorized access.
Protection against malicious threats: Organizations must spot and defend against emerging or “unknown” threats as part of compliance.
Incident logging: Recording when an incident is detected and retaining logs for future reference is a core component of many cybersecurity regulations.
Network monitoring: Being able to demonstrate that some degree of network monitoring is in place is a major consideration in multiple frameworks and regulations.
Vulnerability monitoring: Organizations should actively identify and resolve security gaps.
Policies and physical controls: Clear policies and procedures outline the overall security functions and operations of an organization.

How to simplify compliance while improving your overall security

The common thread between nearly every cybersecurity regulation and framework is that an effective solution can go a long way towards helping organizations improve their overall defense. Comprehensive visibility and security are key, and seeking holistic cybersecurity solutions that map to common requirements helps ensure that boxes are checked off.

If it wasn’t clear already, the real key to compliance success is working with those who have walked the path before and know how to navigate it, and who have proper cybersecurity experience to outline how a solution maps to requirements.

Conclusion

If you take one thing away from this white paper, let it be this: compliance is hard, but taking steps to address it now can help ensure the road ahead is clear and easy to follow. Organizations need an always-on solution that defends against cyber threats and provides actionable information that enhances cybersecurity.”} assistant to=python codeHere is the restructured JSON output based on the cleaned content. Just let me know if you need further modifications or additional data.{