Cybersecurity & Digital Transformation: Are They a Match?

Digital transformation (DX) forces businesses to make significant changes to their technology and processes so that they are ready to compete in today’s digital landscape. By nature, a change in technology and processes will require a business to evaluate their security and cybersecurity needs. Cybercriminals have become increasingly more sophisticated in their attacks and given a small window or gap into the environment, they can implement a devastating cyberattack.  However, in times of transition business leaders have the opportunity to identify gaps where threats can enter the IT infrastructure – within the people, technology, systems and more – to make sure a company is protected.

Cybersecurity threats have been prevalent for decades.  Yet, many companies still have not adopted a security-first culture for their organizations. This critical misstep may be due to an understaffed IT department, lack of strategic planning, and/or implementation of the wrong tools or partners. A breach or loss of critical data can be particularly devastating for businesses in the SMB market. As reported by multiple sources, more than half of all small businesses that suffer a cyberattack will be out of business within six months as a result.

In order to adopt a digital-first strategy, businesses must look at their processes and products, and strategize on ways to make them more efficient, effective and secure. One example of this is implementing advanced automation platforms, such as robotic process automation (RPA), to handle low-payoff, manual activities related to sensitive data processes. RPA can streamline and standardize processes so they’re carried out with very little variability or error. In reality, anytime a data transfer is executed by a manual process it inherently increases the risk of exposing sensitive data. By using RPA, companies can take human eyes off sensitive data by automating the transfer of that data from one system to another. A significant amount of breaches come from unintentional employee errors, and automating processes can standardize and reduce some of those related risks. With RPA, access to systems can be better managed, controlled and audited.