There’s no time to be complacent

A surge in remote working has introduced new vulnerabilities for cyber attackers to exploit, while growing e-commerce means there’s much more of our personal data online to protect. But the biggest risk to our security might well be our own complacency amid this changing threat environment.

Generally, digital trust runs high across the Nordic region.

The results from our recent survey, the TietoEVRY Security Barometer, bear out that view.

However, our survey also reveals that there’s still lots of room for improvement. For example, three out of ten Swedish respondents said that they’d been refraining from online shopping out of a fear of being hacked. And in Norway, half of respondents were sceptical that private companies process their data in a satisfactory way.

Such findings are concerning and they underscore the need for digital service providers to step up their efforts to protect their business, their employees and users.

Organizations will do well to start by looking to understand their digital risks. Are you baking security into the design of your product right from the start? How do you handle security from a governance, risk and compliance perspective? Are you applying today’s security best practices? And last but not least, is security widely understood across your organization?

At the end of the day, humans are the weakest link in your defences. Even the most effective technology defences for thwarting a cyberattack can easily be undone by a simple case of human error. Awareness training for all staff should therefore be an ongoing exercise, with everyone made aware that they each have a part to play in maintaining informational security.

All this applies just as much to public sector entities as it does to private businesses. According to our survey, the majority of respondents in Finland, Sweden and Norway would vote digitally in their next parlamentary election, if offered the option to do so. This reminds me of just how fortunate we are to live in societies where e-democacy is even possible. But it also underlines how we must not rest on our laurels: digital trust is continuously evolving through people’s experiences and can be taken away as easily as it is given.

Fortunately, there are lots of actions you can take to strengthen your security processes and nurture the digital trust that is vital for business growth. Every day, we in TietoEVRY help our customers within the private and public sector to ensure that their services and solutions are safe to use. This is our specialty and we’re happy to help.