Viruses, malware, Trojans can erase all your data or can make changes in the program so that the files become inaccessible or non-readable for you. A new type of threat has come to the internet world known as ''ransom ware'' where cloud accounts are held hostage and point-of-sale systems are affected. These threats are very common in online selling and e-commerce portals where the hacker will have access to the data of the customers and will ask the company owner to pay up. If the company owner fails to pay, then the hacker is free to do whatever s/he pleases to do with that customer data.

How Cyber Security Assessment is done?

IT Security systems differ from similar processes in other business verticals like finance, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) or customer support. The right tool of assessment and identifying the right ''Key Performance Indicators'' (KPI) is crucial in this. Huge data packets are sent and received in any IT network and identifying a single flaw in them is like searching a needle in a haystack. Hence the Cyber Security Assessment systems should be robust enough to first identify the possible flaws in your existing IT infrastructure and Network Penetration testing.

Once the possible flaw is identified, there should be mechanisms to fix them quickly. There should be alarms set in the system which will red-flag any possible security breach which is occurring in the network and should be able to identify any kind of change in the network. Often hackers find new ways to attack the IT infrastructure of any organization and if your IT security functions do not have the intelligence to detect them, there might be serious concerns arising later.

A Balanced scorecard (BSC) was used to evaluate the IT security measures way back in the 1990s. This methodology is still used to measure the key performance indicators (KPI) of other business functions. There are four most crucial KPIs in BSC- Financial, internal business processes, customer-centric metric, training, and development.

VAPT Testing

VAPT stands for Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Testing. This testing uses methodologies to check your static and dynamic data in your network and identifies the weak links in the system. Once the weak links are identified, there are software patches and new applications released to cover the gap. The system should be embedded with artificial intelligence which will detect the plausible security threats. These systems not only detect the regular virus and firewall threats, but they are also capable to detect any new kind of hacking mechanism which might be newly developed by the intruders.
Employing a good cybersecurity consultant
If you employ a good company to manage your IT infrastructure and they have qualified cybersecurity consultants, then they should be able to audit the present security systems of your company. Then they will point out the high-risk-vulnerability areas like using username and password in a website where the data is unencrypted.

If there is old software which has not been upgraded with the new innovations in the field of Cybersecurity in the form of patches, they tend to pose a considerable threat. These are some of the areas which need to be looked into while designing a robust Cyber Security Assessment mechanism. This assessment should include Spam Management, Patches Management, Antivirus/Antispyware coverage, Incidents Management, Audits Management etc.