Expert Tasks Organisations Board on Involvement as Cybercrime Global Damages May Hit $6 trillion in 2021

The Co-Founder and the Chief Operating Officer of Digital Encode Limited, Dr. Obadare Peter Adewale has called for the proactive involvement of organisations board members in discussion related to cyber security and fraud.

While stressing that no company is totally immune against cyber attacks, Adewale charged board members to focus on management of risk associated with cyber security and fraud.

The Information Technology expert noted that the high dependency on the internet and adoption of digital transformation has led to the increase in cyber criminals activities.

Addressing this issue, Adewale stressed that cybersecurity readiness and resilience is therefore a journey not a destination.

The Digital Encode Boss stated this at the 2020 National Information Technology Reporters’ Association (NITRA) Virtual Innovative Tech Webinar held recently.

According to him, cybercrime damages are projected to cost the world over US6 trillion annually in 2021, up from US3 trillion in 2015.

Speaking on the biggest threat to enterprise organization, Adewale stated that findings has shown that at every 11 seconds, businesses will fall victim to a ransomware attack in 2021.

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“More than 90% of successful hacks and data breaches steam from phising scams. Most frequent attack methods are social engineering, advanced persistent threats, unpatched ransomware

Adewale also stressed that cybersecurity/fraud is a discussion topic for the board and not for the data center alone. Backing up his claim, he explained that 60% of small businesses that suffer cyberattack are out of business within 6 months.

He also highlighted that 53% security personnel believed that their enterprise will experience a cyberattack in the next 12 months.

While urging vigilance, he said the survey revealed 87% believe that the rapid shift to work from home will increase the risk of data privacy and protection issues.

Also, 54% believe will take advantage of the pandemic to disrupt organisation. However, 51% (only half) are highly confident in their security team to detect and respond to cyber threats during the pandemic.

Although much is at stake, the Digital Encode Boss lamented that the confidence level is low.

Speaking further, he urged and advised organizations to invest in people and process and not only in technology, in an effort to collectively combat the looming threat.

Adewale recommended that for safety in the cyberspace, organizations must address cybersecurity readiness and resilience on a number of dimensions so as to understand the big picture while integrating and coordinating all operational risk management activities.

In addition, he said it is important that the executive team develop a risk intelligence quotient and also build an Intelligent Security Operations Center (SOC) based on AI & Machine Learning.