Cyber incidents can strike at any time—whether it’s in the middle of a team meeting on Wednesday or as you’re closing up shop before a holiday weekend. That’s why being prepared to respond at a moment’s notice is crucial. Careful incident management is an essential part of your cybersecurity, safeguarding your data and keeping you from being caught off guard.
What Is Incident Management?
Incident management refers to the plans and procedures an organization uses to respond to an unexpected outage or attack and restore normal operations.
The goal of these plans is to prepare teams to respond quickly and effectively to unplanned events, helping the company return to normal functioning soon and minimize the negative impact of an outage. These preparations often help prevent future incidents by creating strong threat detection systems and response practices.
The Connection to Cybersecurity
Proper planning is key to managing cybersecurity incidents. A cybersecurity incident refers to the unauthorized access and violation of information. Unplanned outages can also be classified as cybersecurity incidents, although the exact distinctions are fuzzy.
However you define them, cybersecurity incidents can have serious consequences. Prolonged downtime leads to a loss in productivity and customer care. Clients lose trust, and your reputation takes a hit. Crucial data can be stolen and huge amounts of resources can be lost trying to resolve issues. You may even face compliance violation fines if proper systems aren’t in place.
Strong incident planning will help you reduce these risks, and you can run your business with peace of mind knowing that you’re ready to respond to cyberattacks.
Covering the Basics
Your incident management strategy will be as unique as your business itself, but here are a few key steps you’ll want to consider as you prepare for unexpected events.
Plan
Assemble a team to be in charge of incident management. This could include techs from your IT company, any in-house IT members you may have, and someone from management. Their job will be to form a detailed plan for responding to and resolving cyber issues.
Identify
One of the first things your team should do is identify what threats your business is most susceptible to. Consider industry norms, your unique systems, and current cyber trends. Develop a system for classifying the severity of threats and how that will alter responses.
Detect
Next, put systems and software in place that can detect and report suspicious activity, such as firewalls, MDR, or EDR. If this phase is done well, many attacks can be stopped before they even occur.
Respond
Decide how you will deal with different kinds of risks. Work with your IT team to implement tools that will help you contain attacks and reduce losses. Establish specific procedures for eradicating and managing the incident, including how employees should respond to threats and what each person is responsible for doing in the event of a disaster.
Include communication protocols in your response plans, such as who will be informed of the attack and when, what kind of information will be shared, and how staff members can communicate with each other during a cyber emergency.
Recover
Once an incident or compromise is contained and resolved, it’s time to get up and running again. Make plans to assess the damage and outline how you’ll resolve any lingering issues, restore operations, and recover any lost data.
Practice
An important part of incident management is running regular incident drills. Make sure everyone understands their roles and that there aren’t any gaps in your plan. Any time the plan is changed to meet growing needs or address new cyber risks, it’s crucial to run another test.
Learn
After each test or actual incident, carefully evaluate your response techniques. Identify any weak points and make plans for improved and increased safety. As your business and the threat landscape evolve, update your plan often to ensure your readiness.
Be Ready for Anything with Run Networks
With Run Networks, your success is our success. That’s why we’re dedicated to understanding your business and what will be best for it, including managing your data. We have years of experience creating tailored data recovery solutions to improve your business continuity and incident management, as well as enhance your security, efficiency, and competitive edge. When it comes to preparing for cybersecurity incidents, don’t wait. Request a network evaluation today so you always be prepared.
