The innovations in today’s digital world continue to advance at a tremendous pace, and 2016 didn’t fail to have its own impact on society. As a hobbyist in remote flight, the introduction of drones to deliver blood and medicines in Rwanda from a Silicon Valley startup was an amazing example of how the Internet of Things can have a hugely positive impact on society. I can’t wait for the completion of the $10 million Tricorder XPRIZE to be announced in early 2017, when fiction is expected to become fact, as a portable wireless device that is anticipated to be able to monitor and diagnose health conditions.
What can we expect in 2017 from a cybersecurity perspective? Personally, I believe 2017 and early 2018 will be the most exciting years in terms of evolving our cybersecurity capabilities as businesses prepare for the May 2018 deadlines imposed by upcoming EU legislation changes. This is a rare opportunity to step back and take stock of our capabilities and validate if they are still fit for their purpose, both for the approaching deadline and thereafter. This is a welcome driver to look to the future as security professionals are often so caught up in enabling the ongoing technology innovations and managing evolving cyber risks.
So here are my predictions for the next 12 months:
1. 2017 is the year businesses need to get prepared for the May 2018 deadline for upcoming EU legislation in the form of the GDPR and NIS Directive.
2. Businesses will be vulnerable as they are immobilized by the confusion of what a good next-generation endpoint strategy looks like.
3. We will see the cybersecurity landscape continue to change.
4. While senior cybersecurity skills are in reasonable shape, practitioners are in demand, and outsourcing capabilities are not scaled for evolving demands (volume of work, hybrid cloud/on-premise services, incident response, next-generation SOC requirements, training and running AI/big data systems).
5. Most companies will confirm whether cyber insurance will become a part of their investment strategy and realize that insurers are a valuable point for CISOs wishing to translate and validate risk to senior executives to help better understand their business’s cyber risks.
6. Cross-domain incidents will stop organizations siloing IoT/OT, and business/home systems, and help them start to realize it is actually one, big cyber mesh.
It will be interesting to see how many of these predictions come true over the next 12 months. If experience has taught me anything, some will have been realized in half that time, while others may take a little longer - and, as always, I’m sure we’ll be thrown a few curveballs. The only near guarantee I can give is that the digital world will continue to have an amazing and positive impact on our lives, and I’m proud to be part of the global cybersecurity community that supports its enablement.
What are your cybersecurity predictions for 2017? Share your thoughts in the comments.
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