Cybersecurity As #1 Outsourcing Priority for Businesses

Progressive Security Threats

Technologies evolve fast, and so do security risks. Triumph of the global networks and digitalization increased business connectivity, filling our lives with endless information flows. Data security is not a mere technical matter anymore, according to Peter Sondergaard, Gartner VP. We have to think about the information security all the time when using our personal devices, emails or network in general.

According to the ISACA/RSA Conference State of Cybersecurity survey, 30% of security experts deal with fishing attacks every day. There are many well-known threats, used by criminals to damage businesses, e.g.: phishing, malware, hacking attempts, SQL injections, watering hole attacks etc. Unfortunately, the list of threats is infinite, as each day, malware and malicious techniques are updated to bypass security measures, and thousands of zero-day exploits are discovered.

Innovations Empower Cybersecurity

Technological advances framed a list of areas, dependent on cybersecurity. As stated in Deloitte’s Global Outsourcing Survey 2016, 58% of companies implement innovations on their way to Digital Transformation to increase the quality of services. Such innovations, as cloud technologies or Internet of Things, introduced a sheer number of security concerns and challenges this year alone.

Cloud Security. Many businesses already started migrating their infrastructure, software, and databases to the cloud. On the other hand, lots of companies are still hesitating about necessity and importance of such transformations.

Such security concerns are relevant for all businesses. As mentioned in the Cloud Security 2016 Spotlight Report by the Information Security Community, there are many barriers to cloud adoption, and they are expanding. Here’s a list of the five biggest barriers:

• 53% of businesses are unsure about cloud adoption due to general security concerns.
• 42% of businesses are concerned about legal and regulatory compliance.
• 40% of companies are afraid of data loss/leakage risks.
• 35% of businesses are uncertain about integration processes with existing IT environments.
• 26% of companies stopped migration processes due to lack of expertise.

In total, 91% of organizations have security concerns regarding cloud technologies.

IoT Security. The Internet of Things security is equally important. The ISACA/RSA Survey shows that 53% of entrepreneurs are very much concerned about decent protection against attacks. According to Verizon’s State of the Market: Internet of Things 2016 Report, IoT security deals with the following areas:

• Governance, risk management, and compliance (GRC)
• Threat management
• Authentication and privacy
• Professional security services.

In order to provide proper and secure communications between devices, companies need to develop systems, policies, and procedures for information management and other processes.

Plethora of innovations and continuous advances in technology became primary reasons for companies to seek help from experienced security providers.

Legislation as Outsourcing Driver

For many businesses, security has become one of the most popular trends in outsourcing. According to the ISACA/RSA Conference State of Cybersecurity Survey, 82% of headquarters are concerned about cybersecurity. Both large corporations and small businesses understand the importance of the data safety, as today each company has a legion of vulnerable processes, and security threats are expected to increase in numbers every day.

Cybersecurity calls for special attention because of the new European Privacy Directive, aiming to protect user privacy. In case of adoption of the Directive, this holistic set of rules will limit companies’ vital business processes, such as data sharing and signing consent forms. Of course, there are dozens of other regulatory rules, which companies should abide by: anti-corruption, tax regulations, trade agreements etc. Thus, to avoid non-compliance risks, companies prefer to outsource their security challenges to experts.

As mentioned in Deloitte’s Survey, the necessity to conform to the legislation and regulations has pushed at least 50% of companies to outsource their work.

Outsourcing Growth Progresses

Despite the uncertain economic conditions at the end of 2015 and the beginning of 2016, the outsourcing budgets were slightly increased. It turns out that in 2016 many large companies reduced their outsourcing quotas, which didn’t influence their cost savings. IT providers modified their engagement models and pricing to create better offers for the SMBs. These are the two main reasons why today SMBs spend about the same budgets on outsourcing their IT activities as large corporations. Today an outsourcing budget is equal to approximately 10.6% of the average IT funds. Furthermore, according to IT Outsourcing Statistics report by Computer Economics, an IT research firm focused on IT metrics and research, almost 60% of business owners confirmed that they plan to increase their outsourcing quotas and outsourced tasks.

Single Vendor – a New Trend?

Outsourcing has always been one of the best ways to increase company’s capabilities without excessive investments. Delegating a part of company’s processes to an experienced provider drastically reduces costs on the support of internal departments. Additionally, such practice helps to strengthen specific business areas, where a company lacks sufficient expertise. Though many companies normally cooperated with different IT providers to get qualified and up-to-date services, in 2016 the situation changed. Vendor consolidation has become the digital trend of the year. Each company wants to reduce the number of vendors to one and let them do all of the outsourcing work to improve the quality of service offers. It helps to receive, automate, and control all processes as a whole and have only one authorized executive.

Evolution Towards Cybersecurity

Naturally, cybersecurity has always been a fundamental concern. Nowadays, in the era of rapid technological and economic changes, businesses have to adapt to the wide range of regulations and standards, and frequently need to reshape most of their internal processes. Moreover, companies’ reputation and clients’ satisfaction depend largely on ensuring data and businesses security. All these trends made cybersecurity a #1 outsourcing priority. It is essential for companies to outsource their security challenges to time-proven vendors and get qualified services on schedule.

However, not only businesses were affected by these changes. IT providers also have to maintain the quality of their services, as nowadays vendors are valued for their multifunctionality and reliability. That is why many IT providers have expanded the scope of their practices and expertise in different areas to keep their regular customers and attract new clients.

Have anything to add about Cybersecurity Outsourcing Trends? Please share your thoughts in the comments.