Cybersecurity Risk Evaluations

🔍 What Is a Risk Assessment Methodology? A risk assessment methodology is the structured approach an organization uses to identify, analyze, evaluate, and prioritize risks. It ensures consistent, repeatable assessments across all business areas and is essential for risk-informed decision-making. ⸻ ✅ Core Components of a Risk Assessment Methodology: 1. Risk Identification • Pinpoint what could go wrong (risk events). • Sources: business processes, historical incidents, regulatory changes, third-party risks, IT systems, etc. • Tools: brainstorming, risk checklists, process walkthroughs, SWOT, interviews, PESTLE. 2. Risk Analysis • Determine the likelihood and impact of each risk. • Approaches: • Qualitative (e.g., High/Medium/Low or Heat Maps) • Semi-quantitative (e.g., scoring systems 1–5 for likelihood and impact) • Quantitative (e.g., Monte Carlo, VaR, financial modeling) 3. Risk Evaluation • Compare risk levels to your risk appetite and tolerance thresholds. • Decide which risks are acceptable, and which need treatment or escalation. 4. Risk Prioritization • Rank risks based on their score to allocate resources effectively. • Often visualized in a risk matrix or heat map. 5. Risk Treatment (Optional in Assessment Phase) • Recommend how to handle critical risks: • Avoid • Transfer • Mitigate (via controls) • Accept 📊 Common Methodologies Used: 1️⃣ISO 31000 Framework Emphasizes integration, structure, and continuous improvement in risk management. 2️⃣ COSO ERM Framework Aligns risk with strategy and performance across governance, culture, and objective-setting. 3️⃣ Basel II/III for Financial Risk Used in banking and finance, focusing on credit, market, and operational risk. 4️⃣ NIST Risk Assessment Applied in cybersecurity and federal agencies, emphasizing threats, vulnerabilities, and impacts. 🎯 Best Practices: • Use both inherent and residual risk ratings. • Involve first-line teams for accurate process-level risk input. • Align methodology with risk appetite and strategic objectives. • Document risk criteria (likelihood/impact definitions) clearly. • Update the risk assessment periodically or after significant events.

The OWASP® Foundation Threat and Safeguard Matrix (TaSM) is designed to provide a structured, action-oriented approach to cybersecurity planning. This work on the OWASP website by Ross Young explains how to use the OWASP TaSM and as it relates to GenAI risks: https://lnkd.in/g3ZRypWw These new risks require organizations to think beyond traditional cybersecurity threats and focus on new vulnerabilities specific to AI systems. * * * How to use the TaSM in general: 1) Identify Major Threats - Begin by listing your organization’s key risks. Include common threats like web application attacks, phishing, third-party data breaches, supply chain attacks, and DoS attacks and unique threats, such as insider risks or fraud. - Use frameworks like STRIDE-LM or NIST 800-30 to explore detailed scenarios. 2) Map Threats to NIST Cybersecurity Functions Align each threat with the NIST functions: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, and Recover. 3) Define Safeguards Mitigate threats by implementing safeguards in 3 areas: - People: Training and awareness programs. - Processes: Policies and operational procedures. - Technology: Tools like firewalls, encryption, and antivirus. 4) Add Metrics to Track Progress - Attach measurable goals to safeguards. - Summarize metrics into a report for leadership. Include KPIs to show successes, challenges, and next steps. 5) Monitor and Adjust Regularly review metrics, identify gaps, and adjust strategies. Use trends to prioritize improvements and investments. 6) Communicate Results Present a concise summary of progress, gaps, and actionable next steps to leadership, ensuring alignment with organizational goals. * * * The TaSM can be expanded for Risk Committees by adding a column to list each department’s top 3-5 threats. This allows the committee to evaluate risks across the company and ensure they are mitigated in a collaborative way. E.g., Cyber can work with HR to train employees and with Legal to ensure compliance when addressing phishing attacks that harm the brand. * * * How the TaSM connects to GenAI risks: The TaSM can be used to address AI-related risks by systematically mapping specific GenAI threats - such as sensitive data leaks, malicious AI supply chains, hallucinated promises, data overexposure, AI misuse, unethical recommendations, and bias-fueled liability - to appropriate safeguards. Focus on the top 3-4 AI threats most critical to your business and use the TaSM to outline safeguards for these high-priority risks, e.g.: - Identify: Audit systems and data usage to understand vulnerabilities. - Protect: Enforce policies, restrict access, and train employees on safe AI usage. - Detect: Monitor for unauthorized data uploads or unusual AI behavior. - Respond: Define incident response plans for managing AI-related breaches or misuse. - Recover: Develop plans to retrain models, address bias, or mitigate legal fallout.

Cyber Risk Quantification: Making IT Risk Tangible In today’s hyper-connected world, cybersecurity is no longer just a technical concern, it is a critical business risk. Yet, many executives struggle to understand the real impact of cyber threats in financial or operational terms. Enter Cyber Risk Quantification (CRQ), a framework designed to translate abstract IT risks into tangible, decision-ready metrics. Introducing the FAIR Model The Factor Analysis of Information Risk (FAIR) model is the gold standard for quantifying cyber risk. Unlike qualitative risk assessments that rely on “low, medium, high” labels, FAIR provides a structured, quantitative methodology to answer the key question: “If a cyber event occurs, how much could it cost the business?” FAIR breaks down risk into four components: Threat Event Frequency (TEF) – How often a threat is expected to act against an asset. Vulnerability (Vuln) – Likelihood that the threat event will succeed. Loss Magnitude (LM) – The financial, reputational, or operational impact if the event succeeds. Risk = TEF × Vuln × LM – Providing a clear, dollarized estimate of potential losses. Example Calculation for Executives Imagine an organization with a critical customer database: Threat Event Frequency (TEF): 4 attempts per year Vulnerability: 25% chance an attack succeeds Loss Magnitude (LM): $2 million per successful breach Annualized Loss Exposure (ALE) = TEF × Vuln × LM ALE=4×0.25×2,000,000=$2,000,000ALE = 4 × 0.25 × 2,000,000 = \$2,000,000ALE=4×0.25×2,000,000=$2,000,000 This simple calculation turns a vague IT risk into a boardroom-ready metric: a potential $2 million annual exposure. Decision-makers can now prioritize security investments, insurance coverage, and risk mitigation with confidence. Why Executives Should Care Budget Allocation: Quantifiable risk allows CFOs to justify cybersecurity spend with precise ROI estimates. Board Reporting: Instead of subjective descriptions, risk is expressed in dollars at risk, making reporting more impactful. Strategic Planning: Organizations can compare cyber risk against other business risks, enabling data-driven decision-making. Cyber risk no longer needs to live in the shadows of IT jargon. With FAIR, it becomes measurable, understandable, and actionable. Call to Collaboration Cybersecurity leaders, risk managers, and C-suite executives: How is your organization quantifying cyber risk today? Are you still relying on qualitative labels, or have you embraced tangible financial risk quantification? Let’s share insights and elevate cyber risk to the level it deserves in strategic conversations. #CyberSecurity #RiskManagement #FAIRModel #ITGovernance #CyberRiskQuantification #CISO #CIO #CFO #BusinessRisk #InformationSecurity #TechRisk #ExecutiveInsights @ISACA – for professional cybersecurity standards @CISO Network – executive-level visibility @RiskLens – FAIR model thought leaders @Harvard Business Review – business impact focus

Here is a simple, high impact way of doing a cyber risk assessment that's not over engineered or as simple as asking "what keeps you up at night"... 1. Start with what matters most Identify your critical assets—data, systems, processes, services. What would materially impact the business if disrupted, stolen, or misused? 2. Define realistic risk scenarios Describe how a threat could impact those assets. Example: “A third party gains unauthorized access to our production database via compromised credentials.” 3. Estimate impact If that scenario happened, what would the consequences be? Consider downtime, financial loss, legal exposure, and reputational damage. 4. Estimate likelihood How exposed are you? Are relevant threats active? Are your current controls effective? This part should be structured—but doesn’t need to be overly complex. 5. Prioritize Sort risks by impact × likelihood. Flag what needs attention now, and what can be monitored or accepted. 6. Assign ownership and follow through Risk assessments only work if someone is responsible for reducing the risk. Assign owners, track actions, and update over time. A good risk assessment doesn’t need to be complex. It just needs to be structured, realistic, and focused on helping people make decisions. Save this post for your next assessment planning session. #cybersecurity #riskmanagement #securityleadership

How well is your organization prepared to manage cybersecurity risks? Effective cybersecurity risk management is about adopting a structured approach to identify, assess, and mitigate risks before they cause harm. Lets get into it: 1. Identifying Risks - What Are We Protecting? Asset Inventory - Identify critical data, systems, and infrastructure. Threat Analysis - Determine the biggest risks (e.g., ransomware, insider threats, phishing). Vulnerability Assessment - Uncover the weak points (e.g., personnel, outdated software, misconfigurations). Here, you get to gather enterprise knowledge, operational areas, the human factor, infrastructure and threat landscape. Assessing Risks - How Serious Are They? Once risks are identified, they must be evaluated based on: Likelihood - How probable is the threat? Impact - What would be the financial, operational, or reputational damage? Using these insights, risks can be ranked from low to critical, ensuring high-priority threats receive immediate attention. Treating Risks - What’s the Plan? Organizations must decide how to handle each risk using one of these four strategies: Avoid - Eliminate the risk (e.g., discontinuing risky software or services). Mitigate - Implement controls (e.g., firewalls, encryption, multi-factor authentication). Transfer - Shift responsibility (e.g., cyber insurance, third-party security services). Accept - Tolerate the risk when mitigation isn’t feasible or cost-effective. Continuous Monitoring - Staying Ahead of Threats Risk management is an ongoing process. Cyber threats evolve daily, so organizations must: Monitor & Detect - Use real-time security tools (SIEM, threat intelligence). Test & Improve - Conduct regular security audits, penetration testing, and employee training. Review & Adapt - Update security policies based on new threats and industry best practices. Frameworks I would recommend: TARA by MITRE, NIST RMF, COSO ERM, OCTAVE(choose one that best works for your organization and stick with it.) Remember, good cybersecurity risk management turns uncertainty into strategy. Infographic: Rachid EL BOUKIOUTY #cybersecurity #RiskManagement #CybersecurityGRC #GRC #ThirdpartyRiskMnagement #InformationSecurity #DataSecurity #Governance

🧠💻 Evaluating the Cybersecurity Risks of Advanced AI Artificial Intelligence has been a reliable ally in cybersecurity for years, powering malware detection, traffic analysis, and anomaly spotting. But as AI moves beyond narrow applications toward AGI-level capabilities, we’re entering a new phase where the same tech that defends can also attack. 🔍 In a recent blog post by Google DeepMind, they introduced a comprehensive new framework to evaluate how advanced AI might be misused in cyberattacks. It’s worth a read, not just for researchers, but for anyone serious about preparing their defenses for the future. 🛡️ Here’s what stood out to me: The framework evaluates every phase of the cyberattack chain - from reconnaissance to exploitation to malware development. It’s grounded in real-world data, with over 12,000 observed cases across 20 countries, thanks to Google’s Threat Intelligence Group. It identifies critical “bottlenecks” where AI could significantly reduce the cost and effort required to execute attacks. Existing frameworks like MITRE ATT&CK weren’t built with AI-driven threats in mind—this fills that gap. The result? A 50-point benchmark that can guide defensive priorities, red teaming, and policy decisions. 🔐 Early evaluations offer some relief—present-day AI models alone don’t yet enable breakthrough offensive capabilities. But we’d be unwise to ignore what’s coming. If you’re in cybersecurity, threat research, or policy, this post is a must-read. It offers not just perspective but tools to help defenders get ahead of adversaries who may soon wield smarter, faster AI. 📖 Read the blog : [Link in the comment section] #AI #Cybersecurity #ThreatIntelligence #RedTeam #AIsecurity #ResponsibleAI #DeepMind

Here's what I've learned from 𝟭𝟬𝟳𝟱 𝗴𝗮𝗽𝘀 on risk assessments during SOC 2 and ISO 27001 projects: 𝗕𝗢𝗧𝗧𝗢𝗠 𝗟𝗜𝗡𝗘 Companies do not have a practical, repeatable approach to doing risk assessments that identify meaningful results, prioritize them, and do something about the risk they identify. 𝗛𝗘𝗥𝗘'𝗦 𝗪𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗜'𝗠 𝗦𝗘𝗘𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝟭. 𝗣𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗰 Companies tend to adopt generic risk assessment policies that do not reflect the reality of work performed on the ground. The best companies I work with take it a step further and adopt customized and practical procedures that do a good job explaining why and how to do a risk assessment. 𝟮. 𝗠𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗱𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝗹𝗮𝗿𝗴𝗲𝗹𝘆 𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝗱𝗼𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 Companies tend to rely on the person doing the work to figure it out. As a result, quality and consistency varies wildly. The best companies I work with have operationalized their risk assessment process. They log the results in a standard format that can be tracked over time and digested by leadership. 𝟯. 𝗟𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀𝗻'𝘁 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘂𝗹𝘁𝘀 𝗺𝗲𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴𝗳𝘂𝗹 𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲 At most companies top level leadership has never even seen the "risk register". At the best companies I work with top level leadership are getting regular executive summaries on the risk register. There is healthy debate about the findings that refine the results. For top risks, they are consistently briefed on risk reduction activities and take risk treatment decisions seriously. --- Is anyone especially proud of how they do risk assessments at their company? #cybersecurity #riskassessment #risk

Cyber risk is now a fundamental business issue rather than merely an IT one. Resilience depends on knowing your organization's appetite for cyber risk and establishing explicit risk tolerance thresholds. Smarter decision-making, cybersecurity alignment with company strategy, and stakeholder confidence are all made possible by quantifying cyber risk. For more effective, proactive protection, adopt a data-driven approach to risk management rather than relying solely on intuition. In addition to being recommended practices, establishing a defined cyber risk appetite and employing cyber risk quantification are necessary to satisfy SEBI's Cyber Security and Cyber Resilience Framework (CSCRF) standards. In order to fit with CSCRF's emphasis on comprehensive risk assessment and resilience, organisations can set precise risk appetite levels, continuously monitor exposure, and prioritise measures by quantifying cyber hazards in monetary terms. In addition to adhering to legal requirements, this strategy fortifies proactive defences and makes sure that the company's resilience plan and cyber risk appetite coincide.

Cybersecurity risks aren’t just IT problems. They’re business risks. Ignoring them? That’s a direct hit to your bottom line. ☑ Step 1: Identify your risk landscape. What threats are lurking? Where are your weak spots? Map them out. ☑ Step 2: Prioritize what matters most. Not all risks are equal. Financial loss, compliance violations, reputation damage—rank them. ☑ Step 3: Choose your defense. Accept the risk if it’s within tolerance. Avoid high-impact risks that aren’t worth the cost. Transfer the risk through insurance or third parties. Mitigate it with strong security controls. ☑ Step 4: Build a real-time risk register. Keep cybersecurity risks visible, updated, and aligned with business objectives. ☑ Step 5: Report and refine. Executives need a clear picture. Use heat maps, dashboards, and KPIs to track trends and make smarter decisions. Cyber threats evolve. So should your risk strategy. 💬 Drop a "SECURE" in the comments if cybersecurity is a top priority for your bank. Need help? Let’s talk.

Letter R: Risk (Assessment, Management, and Mitigation): A Continuous Guardian Our ‘A to Z of Cybersecurity’ tackles Risk Management - the ongoing process of identifying, evaluating, and mitigating potential threats to your organization. It's like having a security guard who never sleeps! Effective risk management isn't a one-time event; it's a continuous cycle: Identifying the Threats: · Threat Landscape Analysis: Understanding the evolving threats in your industry and the broader cybersecurity landscape. · Vulnerability Assessments: Regularly scanning your systems and processes to identify potential weaknesses. · Asset Inventory: Knowing what data and systems you have is crucial for assessing risk. Taking Action: · Risk Mitigation Strategies: Implement controls to reduce the likelihood or impact of a risk. This could involve technical solutions, policy changes, or user awareness training. · Risk Transfer: In some cases, transferring risk through insurance might be appropriate. · Risk Acceptance: For certain low-impact risks, accepting the risk might be the most cost-effective solution. The Continuous Loop: · Regular Reviews: The risk landscape is constantly evolving, so ongoing assessments and adjustments are crucial. · Lessons Learned: Analyze past incidents to improve your risk management practices. · Communication & Awareness: Keep stakeholders informed about identified risks and implemented mitigation strategies. Effective risk management is the cornerstone of a secure organization. By proactively identifying and mitigating threats, you can build a resilient digital fortress. #Cybersecurity #RiskManagement