In 2022, a departing employee for Yahoo stole trade secrets and other sensitive information to take to a direct competitor. The files included source code, backend advertising architecture, ad placement algorithms, and much more. Essentially, it was a massive security breach that Yahoo became the victim of. Unfortunately, this incident is far from the only of its kind, and highlights the need for every business to have a robust insider threat program in place.
But there’s more to insider threats than overly ambitious (and criminal) ex-employees. In this article, we’re going to dive into the types of threats, their impact, and the systems that work to defend against them.
Understanding Insider Threats
These threats are centered around people within the organization who use their access to cause harm to that organization—intentionally or otherwise. This could range from an employee stealing data, a successful phishing scam, or even something as simple as a password accidentally sent to the wrong email address. These threats are categorized as one of three types, so let’s go over what they are.
Types of Threats
Malicious
Malicious threats are the result of intentional actions taken by an individual to cause harm. Think sabotage or data theft. To use a real-life example, let’s look at a series of data breaches at MailChimp. Users’ personal data was illegally obtained through a phishing scam that tricked at least one employee into exposing their credentials.
Negligent
These incidents are caused by employee actions that are unintentional but careless. A classic case of this would be someone writing their password on a sticky note and leaving it out in the open. We could also take a look at a 2022 incident involving Pegasus Airlines. A data store was left unsecured thanks to a lack of password protection. The result was the exposure of 3.2 million files containing sensitive flight data, personal information on the crew, and software source code.
Accidental
Similar to negligent threats, accidental ones are also unintentional, but they’re the result of pure accident. It could be something as simple as sending a text to the wrong person (we’ve all been there). For Turkish company MongoDB, this sort of accident caused a catastrophic data breach that affected over 275 million Indian citizens.
Their Impact
In the event of a breach from any type of insider threat, the results could range anywhere from minor inconvenience (not likely) to the closure of a company and sweeping legal consequences.
- Financial Losses: Theft, fraud, and remediation efforts can all contribute to significant monetary losses for a company that falls victim to a breach.
- Reputation Damage: Customers give companies their business and money under the assumption that their sensitive information and assets will be protected. When a breach happens, that trust is eroded or broken altogether, causing significant reputational damage to the company.
- Legal Consequences: Depending on factors like the extent of a breach and what kind of data was compromised, an organization could face fines, sanctions, and legal action for failing to comply with data protection laws.
Knowing the potential consequences of falling prey to these threats, it’s vital for your business to have a robust program in place—no matter what industry you’re in.
The Role of Insider Threat Programs
So what is the goal of an insider threat program? It’s a structured initiative that’s designed to identify, manage, and respond to risks that are posed by insiders of an organization. The goal is to protect critical information and maintain your company’s integrity despite threats from phishing scams, employee negligence, and more. These programs are structured with five key components:
- Risk Assessment: The identification of any and all potential internal vulnerabilities will help you be aware of any areas that could hold vulnerabilities.
- Policies and Procedures: These are guidelines that will be followed to respond to threats.
- Monitoring and Detection: This is the implementation of tools and strategies that will be used to detect suspicious activity.
- Response and Mitigation: Should a threat cause a crisis, these strategies will help mitigate their impact and move the business forward.
- Training and Awareness: The more your team knows about potential threats, the less likely they’ll be to fall for phishing scams or make careless mistakes that could snowball into crisis-level incidents.
Developing an Insider Threat Program
Knowing the components of a successful program is only part of the battle. Now it’s time to turn those components into action items by following these steps:
- Conduct Risk Assessment: Take your organization’s risk landscape into account. Identify assets that are critical.
- Develop Policies and Procedures: Create in-depth guidelines for addressing insider threats. This could range from physical security updates to educational training.
- Implement Monitoring Tools: There’s plenty of technology available to monitor the activity of every user in your system and detent suspicious activity and other anomalies.
- Establish Incident Response Plans: Hopefully, the unthinkable doesn’t happen. Unfortunately, there’s no guarantee you’re safe from these threats. To be prepared for those scenarios, a response plan is vital to making it out with minimal disruption.
- Educate and Train Team Members: Fostering a positive culture that embraces education among your team can be the difference between the safety of your data and a breach of it. Establish routine training schedules to make sure everyone is on the same page and up-to-date on the latest threats.
It’s important that there’s strong collaboration between your HR, IT, Legal, and Security departments. When each department is aware of the procedures of the others, emergency preparation and response is incredibly effective.
Best Practices for Implementing Insider Threat Programs
We know we’ve said it a few times already, but employee awareness is paramount. This is a prime example of “your team is only as strong as the weakest link,” so make sure every employee is well equipped and well-prepared.
Continuous monitoring and periodic audits are the best way to make sure every security measure you’ve implemented stays effective, and it’s critical to have a response plan in place. Nobody wants an insider threat to succeed, but the outcome could be catastrophic if there is no response plan in place.
Conclusion
In a tech-heavy business landscape, a comprehensive insider threat program isn’t optional; it’s essential. It can protect your customers, your finances, and the integrity of your company as a whole by being proactive about your internal risks. By investing in its development, you’re investing in the continuity of your operations. At GEM Technology, we’re no strangers to how these programs work. We’ll collaborate with you to make a personalized process that will keep you protected. Get in touch and let’s protect your business!