With technology becoming ever more sophisticated and offering both enhanced opportunities and new vulnerabilities and threats, there is a danger that organizations of every different type leave themselves open to malicious attack or data breaches on a massive scale. Risk management, therefore, is just as vital in cyberspace as it is in the physical world. But what are these cyber-risks?
The Oxford English Dictionary definition is certainly clear enough: “risk”, it says, is “a situation involving exposure to danger”. Risk must be taken to achieve results, but also risk must be managed to achieve positive outcomes and avoid negative consequences.
Avoiding risk is impossible. Risks need to be taken and this is an inevitable and necessary part of all our lives, both personally and professionally. Indeed, if any company or organization in any industry in today’s highly competitive world was to try and pretend that there were no risks in what they did – in effect, that risk did not exist – then quite apart from defaulting on their statutory and legal obligations, they would very quickly fold and disappear from sight.