If your boss won’t give you the budget to improve your security posture - do these 4 things.

Author: Sean Gillen, Director of Business Development

All across the technology spectrum, leaders are being asked to do more with less and cybersecurity is no different. Industry reports have highlighted an increase in threat/attacker capabilities and the increasing complexity in defending but due to business priorities or economic difficulties, budgets are being cut. A problem that many security teams face is how to prioritize spending by making these cuts strategically. Reducing cybersecurity costs while maintaining (or even enhancing) security is a challenge but possible. Here are the four best strategies when faced with declining budgets.

1. Explore Open Source and Built-in Security Solutions:

Open Source Tools

Several open-source cybersecurity tools offer robust capabilities. For example:

• Snort for intrusion detection & prevention

• OSSEC for host-based intrusion detection

• Wireshark for network protocol analysis

• ClamAV for antivirus protection

• pfSense for firewall protection

• Graylog for logging and alerting

Built-in Security Features

Many platforms come with built-in security features that users underutilize. Before investing in new solutions, explore whether the existing infrastructure offers the security measures you need. For example, Windows comes with Windows Defender, Bitlocker, and other security features, while many Linux distributions have built-in tools for enhancing security.

However, before selecting free tools it is essential to ensure that your team has the necessary expertise to use open-source or built-in tools effectively. Without adequate experience, the cost savings may be offset by vulnerabilities due to improper configuration. Free/Open source tools may not have the same level of support compared to some commercial options and may have increased maintenance costs.

Shift Budget to Training and Awareness

Some of the most cited vulnerabilities in any organization are related to human error. A significant percentage of cybersecurity incidents can be traced back to employees clicking on malicious links, using weak passwords, or unintentionally sharing sensitive information. Conduct regular security awareness training sessions. While there is no formal consensus on how to evaluate the success of training program effectiveness, In the long run, this can be more cost-effective than continuously ramping up high-end security solutions.

Research from the Texas Department of Transportation indicates that regularly testing your employees with simulated phishing emails to reinforce training and identify areas where further training might be necessary.

Delve into Consolidation and Standardization

Using multiple security solutions from various vendors can lead to increased costs and complexity. Consider consolidating your security stack. By reducing the number of vendors, you might get better pricing, reduced complexity, and easier integration.

Standardize hardware and software configurations as much as possible. This reduces the number of configurations you have to secure and monitor, which can reduce the complexity of your security approach and the resources needed to maintain it.

Our teams at Digital Boundary Group have found that a good approach is the creation of cross-functional teams in pursuing broader tech alignment. Commonly, siloed teams often duplicate efforts with different technologies that could be better consolidated and orchestrated.

Conduct Regular Audits and Prioritization

Periodically conduct security audits to understand where vulnerabilities exist. This helps in prioritizing the most critical vulnerabilities and ensuring that your budget is focused on the most impactful areas. Not all assets are of equal value or risk. By understanding what data or systems are most crucial to your organization, you can allocate more of your budget to securing them, and potentially reduce expenditures on less critical assets.

It goes without saying that when making changes to reduce cybersecurity costs, always weigh the potential risk against the savings. A reduced budget should never result in a decrease in security effectiveness. The goal of a good cyber strategy is to enhance security while reducing costs.