TALKING
business
‘‘
• Employee education and communication
are key to a successful cybersecurity
strategy, yet 20% of business leaders don’t
know what to do in the event of a data
breach and 36% of respondents have not
received communications about COVID-19
themed malware. Moving forward, 76%
of APJ business leaders say they plan on
additional security training in the future.
• As we look to the new normal, 67%
of business leaders believe that their
organizations should invest more in
building a remote work environment.
• The top cybersecurity challenges expected
in the next 18 months include remote
workforce (54%), new regulation (49%)
and costs of compliance (48%), with
limited budgets (47%) and additional
training (41%) ranking not far behind.
Here are the Australian statistics from 302
participating companies:
“
THOSE OF US WHO HAVE
WORKED IN CYBERSECURITY FOR
MANY YEARS OFTEN START TO THINK
‘WE’VE SEEN IT ALL’. WE HAVEN’T.
Andrew Littleproud, Vice President, APJ
at CrowdStrike
“This year’s CrowdStrike Global Threat Report
provides clear evidence of that. Consider the
dark turn in cybercrime toward preying on
schools, municipal departments and our other
chronically understaffed and overburdened
public institutions. This is different from
targeting large government entities and
corporations, many of whom have resigned
themselves to being targeted by cyberpredators
and have the opportunity to try to
protect themselves from that onslaught. It’s a
different matter entirely when the targets are
schoolchildren, or just ordinary people trying
to go about their daily lives.
“This merciless ransomware epidemic will
continue, and worsen, as long as the practice
remains lucrative, and relatively easy and riskfree.
We’ve developed a platform designed
to stop ransomware for our customers, and
we’ve worked hard to make it easy and
affordable – even for budget-constrained
institutions like our public school systems.
The path ahead – hybrid
working, investment choices
and myriad challenges
• More than half (56%) think their
organization should invest more in
building a remote work environment.
• Cybersecurity is among the top priorities
for additional investment (56%) but all
areas require more resources.
• Remote workforce (47%), new
regulation (31%) and costs of
compliance (42%) seen as top
cybersecurity challenges in the next 18
months, with limited budgets (36%)
and additional training (32%) not far
behind. These were all below the regional
average, with Australia seeing less
challenges than other countries in APJ.
• Technology (49%) the key priority for
investment if budget is available post
COVID-19, with cybersecurity second
(44%), followed by employee training
(39%) and sales (25%).
• Technology budgets still expected
to increase even with COVID-19, with
41% of respondents saying they
expect budgets to be higher, while
38% expect them to stay the same.
Australia was significantly less confident
of higher budgets than the average
across APJ (65%).
• Hiring new staff (38%) and pay rises
(37%) are the most likely areas of budget
cuts in the next six months.
• The vast majority of companies (80%)
are to keep working from home or move
to a hybrid model.
• Most people are concerned about an
increase in remote working from home in
the next six months will put their company
(52%) at more risk of a cyberattack.
This was lower than the regional average
(65%) showing a lack of concern
compared to Australia’s neighbours.
• Remote working has demonstrated to
most companies (58%) that they can
work from anywhere. However, this is
much lower than other APJ markets
(72%), showing Australia is less likely to
embrace a distributed workforce.
• Economic conditions (66%) and new
waves of COVID-19 (60%) are the main
threats in the next six months, with
cybersecurity following in third (45%).
George Kurtz, CrowdStrike CEO and Co-
Founder, said: “Those of us who have worked
in cybersecurity for many years often start to
think ‘we’ve seen it all’. We haven’t.
“As more organizations around the world
deploy next-generation platforms like
CrowdStrike Falcon that can prevent
these threats, the criminal element will
be forced to redirect its efforts elsewhere.
While criminals are relatively predictable
in their tendency to always choose the
path of least resistance, the activities of
nation-states are frequently more relentless
and sophisticated – and as a result, more
challenging for cyber-defenders. This year’s
threat report uncovers numerous new tactics,
techniques and procedures (TTPs) that
state-affiliated threat actors are employing
to accomplish their goals. Of concern here
is the widening variety of goals these highly
capable adversaries may seek to achieve.
“Along with the more traditional objectives
of espionage and surveillance have been
added new tasks, such as sowing widespread
disruption and discord among individuals,
institutions and even whole countries and
populations, all in pursuit of political and
economic gains.
“If there’s one thing this year’s Global
Threat Report really brings home, it’s that
there’s never been a better time to get
involved in cybersecurity. The stakes are
high and rising every day. Those that read
and share this report are helping to educate
themselves and others to better protect
themselves and their communities, both at
work and at home.” •
38 INTELLIGENTCIO www.intelligentcio.com