Importance of Operational Continuity in Cybersecurity

Your OT Security Playbook Is Missing This One Critical Step Most OT security strategies focus on firewalls, segmentation, vulnerability management, and threat detection—all important. But here’s the problem: None of that matters if you don’t know what truly drives your business. What’s missing? Business impact mapping. Too many cybersecurity teams prioritize technical risks without understanding operational risks. Here’s what gets overlooked: -(Direct)Which 3-5 systems are so critical that their failure halts production? -(Indirect) How does an IT failure (ERP, MES, supply chain) impact OT operations? -(Direct & Indirect) What are the financial, safety, and regulatory consequences of downtime? For Example: A global manufacturer had what would be considered great network segmentation but zero resilience planning. When a ransomware attack hit their ERP system, • No raw materials could be ordered. • Scheduling went offline. • Entire plants sat idle for four days. The cost? Millions in lost production. The best security teams don’t just protect networks—they protect business operations. If your security playbook isn’t prioritizing business resilience, it’s not considering significant business risk. What’s the most overlooked risk you’ve seen in OT security? Let’s compare notes. #OTSecurity #CyberResilience #ManufacturingSecurity #IndustrialCyber #CISOInsights

Banks today must operate in an environment of ever‐increasing uncertainty, where extreme events—from cyberattacks and natural disasters to geopolitical shocks—can abruptly disrupt critical supply chains. In the digital age, resilient supply chain risk management is essential not only for maintaining operational continuity but also for protecting the financial ecosystem that supports banks’ services. 1). A comprehensive approach begins with a holistic risk assessment that extends beyond internal systems to encompass all third‐party vendors, technology providers, data centers, and logistics partners. 2). By deploying advanced analytics and artificial intelligence, banks can map their entire supply chain in real time, identify vulnerabilities early, and trigger mitigation strategies to prevent interruptions before they escalate. 3). Diversification is fundamental. Banks are increasingly reducing dependence on any single supplier or geographic region by establishing multiple sources for key products and services. This multi-layered diversification minimizes the risk of disruption if one source fails, ensuring continuity of operations. 4). Equally critical is digital integration: modern technologies such as the Internet of Things, blockchain, and cloud-based platforms provide end-to-end visibility across the supply chain. 5). Continuous monitoring and automated alerts enable banks to rapidly respond to potential problems with flexibility and precision. 6). Robust cybersecurity is also imperative, as digital supply chains are prime targets for increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks. Banks must enforce stringent cybersecurity protocols not only within their own systems but also throughout their vendor networks. 7). Regular audits, compliance with standards like ISO 27001 and the NIST framework, and information sharing with trusted partners help fortify the entire ecosystem against intrusions. 8). Strategic partnerships further strengthen resilience. Collaborative relationships with vendors and technology providers allow banks to jointly develop risk management frameworks, share best practices, and coordinate emergency response plans. 9). Regular scenario planning and stress testing—simulating extreme events like coordinated cyberattacks or supply chain disruptions—ensure that contingency measures are current and actionable. 10). A culture of continuous improvement is vital: post-event reviews, feedback loops, and iterative updates to risk management strategies enable banks to learn from past disruptions and adapt to emerging threats. By integrating these principles—comprehensive risk mapping, diversification, digital integration, robust cybersecurity, strategic partnerships, agile scenario planning, and continuous learning—banks enhance their supply chain resilience and better navigate extreme events in today’s dynamic digital landscape, thereby protecting their operations, customer trust, and overall financial stability.

The 2025 Honeywell Cyber Threat Report reveals a stark reality: the industrial sector is facing a cybersecurity reckoning. Cyberattacks on operational technology (OT) environments have intensified—ransomware surged 46% in six months, while attacks on water systems, transportation networks, and manufacturing plants have caused real-world disruptions. Threat actors are no longer simply infiltrating; they are interrupting critical services and endangering safety and continuity. One notable trend is the rise in USB-based malware and credential-stealing Trojans like Win32.Worm.Ramnit, which surged 3,000% in frequency. In parallel, over 1,800 distinct threats were detected through Honeywell’s Secure Media Exchange (SMX), with alarming infiltration routes observed across removable media, remote access exploits, and compromised credentials. What’s driving this escalation? • Legacy systems with limited security controls remain widely deployed. • Converged IT/OT environments increase the attack surface. • Regulatory pressure, such as the SEC’s cybersecurity disclosure rule, is raising the stakes for leadership teams. The implication is clear: defending the industrial enterprise requires more than traditional cybersecurity postures. It demands a shift toward cyber resilience—a proactive, integrated approach that embeds security into the DNA of operations. At a minimum, organizations must act on five imperatives: 1. Adopt Zero Trust principles—no device, user, or process should be implicitly trusted. 2. Implement strict segmentation between IT and OT networks. 3. Elevate threat visibility with continuous monitoring, detection, and response tools. 4. Enforce multi-factor authentication and access governance. 5. Ensure secure USB/media handling and endpoint control at every entry point. This is not a technology problem alone—it is an operational and leadership mandate. Every breach is now a business risk. Boards, CISOs, and plant leaders must align around a single objective: operational continuity through cyber integrity. Honeywell remains committed to advancing industrial cyber maturity through our ecosystem of threat detection, monitoring, and managed response capabilities. But securing the future will require collective effort—from regulators, vendors, operators, and industry consortia. As the report concludes, it’s not a matter of if your OT environment will be targeted. The question is—will you be ready?

Instead of starting with threats or systems, I start with the value stream. Why? Because business continuity isn’t really about hurricanes, power outages, or servers going down. It’s about something much simpler: preserving the flow of value through the business. Executives don’t care which database is offline. They care that customers can’t buy, contracts can’t close, or invoices can’t be sent. That’s the flow you’re protecting. Here’s how I break it down: 1️⃣ Identify the process that directly supports revenue or mission-critical outcomes. - What activity actually creates value? - For a SaaS platform, it might be the software deployment pipeline. - For a manufacturer, it might be raw materials through production to distribution. - For a hospital, it might be patient intake → treatment → billing. 2️⃣ Map each step in that process — people, systems, vendors, tools. - Who touches this? - What tech or suppliers does it rely on? - Where are the single points of failure? 3️⃣ Estimate what percentage of the company’s total revenue depends on this process. - If it fails, how much of your annual revenue would actually pause or disappear? - Is it a core process that drives 80% of revenue or a supporting function tied to 10%? 4️⃣ Estimate how much of that revenue is at risk in a realistic disruption. - Will you lose all revenue immediately? - Or just delay it? - Be conservative and credible — executives hate inflated numbers. 5️⃣ Spread that loss over operating hours to create an hourly cost of disruption. - Take the annual revenue at risk, divide it by 8,760 hours (for 24/7 ops) or by working hours for narrower processes. - Then add recovery costs (staff overtime, consultants) and reputational or compliance penalties. What you end up with isn’t perfect — but it’s credible. It turns abstract “criticality” into a number: This process costs $X per hour when it’s disrupted. Why this works: ✅ It sidesteps technical jargon — you’re talking value, not servers. ✅ It reframes continuity as a business problem, not an IT problem. ✅ It gives executives a simple, repeatable model to prioritize investments. ✅ And yes, it’s executive-friendly — because it speaks in dollars, not downtime. I’ll walk through a concrete example in my next post. But first, let me ask you — what would you add or improve in this approach? Have you seen a better way to make the financial case for continuity?

The recent attacks on DeepSeek's AI infrastructure highlight a critical shift in our industry. While we've been focusing on how #AI systems can inadvertently stress infrastructure through activities like web scraping, we're now seeing AI platforms themselves become targets of infrastructure attacks. This isn't just about one company's #security challenge. As organizations rapidly integrate AI into their core operations, these AI platforms are becoming critical infrastructure - yet many haven't updated their business continuity planning to reflect this new reality. When your email goes down, you have a backup plan. When your #cloud provider has issues, you have redundancy. But what's your plan for when your AI infrastructure is compromised or unavailable? The DeepSeek incident shows us that AI infrastructure vulnerability isn't theoretical. As these systems become essential to business operations, we need to start treating them with the same rigorous disaster recovery and #businesscontinuity planning we apply to traditional #infrastructure. The future of business resilience isn't just about protecting your servers - it's about ensuring your AI capabilities remain operational when your providers face challenges. This isn't tomorrow's problem. It's today's reality. Read the full story: https://hubs.li/Q034c6jN0 #cybersecurity #innovation

Given the speed of digital transformation and innovation, the conversation is no longer just about cyber security. It’s about operational resilience. The conversation CEOs and the Board care about is how quickly the company can recover and continue normal business operations during a major crisis or incident. This is not a question of NIST, MITRE or ISO. Most don’t know about these frameworks and don’t care. Based on my current client initiatives, there are 5 ways the shift from security to resilience is shaping the future: 1. Deep Focus on Continuity, Not Just Breach Prevention: While traditional cyber security emphasized keeping threats out, resilience is about minimizing downtime and ensuring critical operations can continue, even during an attack. Many leaders are incorporating business impact analyses into their asset management and risk management programs. This ties an asset to specific processes and focuses conversations on impacted assets and makes risk quantification more accurate. 2. Cross-Department / Silo Collaboration: Resilience goes beyond the IT and Security teams. It involves HR, legal, operations, and more to ensure that every aspect of the business can respond and recover quickly from disruptions. The culture of the organization will be the biggest obstacle or enabler for response and recovery speed. 3. Regular Simulations and Chaos Drills: Resilient organizations don’t just react to incidents—they proactively prepare with simulations and chaos drills that test their ability to bounce back. If you don’t test alternative processes or minimum process downtime while doing tabletops - you’re doing it wrong. 4. Incident Recovery Speed is the New Benchmark: (Note - the goalpost is now recovery and not just response.) Post-incident recovery time is now as important as breach prevention. Companies that can swiftly restore operations after a breach, like we saw in the #CrowdStrike incident, will have a competitive edge. 5. Third-Party Risk and Supply Chain Resilience: With companies relying more heavily on third-party vendors, ensuring the resilience of the entire digital ecosystem has become a top priority. Transparency across the chain is leading to more monitoring and audits of data flows, integrations and risks for larger entities We are also seeing CISOs move into the CTO and CIO roles. Once a CISO has established the ability to recover quickly in the face of adversity, it’s often considered a critical trait for promotion. Resilience is not just a trait of great leaders, but of great organizations. As cyber threats continue to evolve, resilience will be the foundation that empowers businesses to thrive, no matter what comes their way. It's time we ask ourselves: Is your company prepared and ready to bounce back after a major disruption? #cyberresilience #security #digitaltransformation #CrowdStrike #cyberstrategy #RevolutionCyber

60% of small businesses close within 6 months of a cyber attack.  Surprised? Most people are. This is a business continuity issue, a cost control issue, and a brand trust issue. What’s the cost of ignoring cybersecurity?    - Operational Downtime : Every minute your systems are down = revenue lost + productivity stalled.  - Regulatory Fines : Non-compliance can hit harder than the breach itself.  - Client Churn : 87% of consumers say they’ll walk away if they can’t trust how you handle their data.  Have you considered these in your own organization? Quick tip: Run a 15-minute tabletop exercise with your leadership team: “What happens if we get hit with ransomware tomorrow?” You’ll quickly spot where your plan is solid and where it’s not. We get your world. Cybersecurity is protection AND its good business. #CyberSecurity #BusinessContinuity #Leadership #RiskManagement #Business

This isn’t just an inconvenience — it’s a warning. I took this photo at a gas station this morning “CASH ONLY!! OUR NETWORK IS DOWN!!” — it wasn’t just a payment issue. It pointed to a broader truth: our critical infrastructure systems are heavily digitized and dangerously fragile. Whether it’s ransomware in the retail POS environment, lateral movement into operational technology (OT), or failure in cloud-connected SCADA systems, IT/OT convergence has made gas stations, water treatment plants, and electrical substations attractive and vulnerable targets. Here’s the problem: -Flat networks -Poor segmentation -Legacy protocols -Minimal visibility into ICS/IIoT assets We’ve seen nation-state APTs, cybercriminals, and hacktivists all take interest in infrastructure. And yet, many operators still treat cyber as an “IT problem.” It’s not. It’s a resilience problem — and the failure scenarios are no longer hypothetical. If we don’t modernize detection, harden edge devices, and train frontline staff, we’ll continue seeing more of this: not just outages, but operational paralysis. Time to elevate OT security to a first-class priority. #cyber #cybersecurity Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney PC Dragos, Inc. Forescout Technologies Inc. KnectIQ Operational Technology Cybersecurity Coalition Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Military Cyber Professionals Association Lucian Niemeyer Christopher Cleary, PMP, CISSP Alison King Kathryn Wang Alexander Botting Philip Travis Berent Trend Micro Madison Horn Brandon Pugh Sean Plankey Robert M. Lee

The Harsh Reality of Today's Cyber Threat Landscape ✅$4.88M average global cost of a data breach ($9.3M in the US) ✅99% of ransomware attempts target your backups ✅24 days average recovery time after a cyber incident ✅75% of IT security professionals report significant impact from AI-powered threats Bill O'Connell, Chief Security Officer at Commvault shared invaluable insights on cyber readiness at Amazon Web Services (AWS) reInforce this week. Here are my 3 key takeaways: 1. The Evolution from Defense to Resilience O'Connell's key insight: "Building the wall higher just led to really good climbers." Traditional security frameworks (CIA Triad, ISO, NIST) focused heavily on prevention, but the evolved CSO/CISO perspective now emphasizes: ✅Focus more on response/recovery rather than just prevention ✅Identify what's most important and plan specifically for those assets ✅Test everything - your plans are only as good as your ability to execute them 2. What Is Minimum Viability When your business is on the line, three things become critical: ✅Identity and Access Management ✅Communication and Collaboration tools ✅Mission Critical Cloud Applications The question isn't if you'll face a cyber incident, but how quickly you can recover your most essential operations. 3. Put Your Recovery into Practice As O'Connell emphasized: Put your recovery into practice. Regular testing and realistic recovery planning are business survival strategies. For organizations ready to assess their cyber readiness, Commvault offers tools and resources to help evaluate your current state and build resilience into your infrastructure. What's your organization's approach to balancing prevention with recovery planning? How are you testing your cyber readiness? #AWSreInforce2025 #CyberSecurity #CommvaultPartner #cyberresilience #continiousbusiness To stay current with the latest trends in #Technology and #Innovation, Subscribe to 👉 #CXOSpiceNewsletter here https://lnkd.in/gy2RJ9xg or 👉 #CXOSpiceYouTube https://lnkd.in/gnMc-Vpj

Too many businesses treat cybersecurity as an afterthought—only paying attention when something goes wrong. But when it does, it’s rarely just a technical glitch. By the time you’re reacting to a crisis, the cost is no longer just financial. You’re dealing with: ✏︎ Operational downtime that stalls momentum. ✏︎ A damaged reputation that may never fully recover. Most teams think being reactive means being adaptable. But the truth is, waiting until something breaks is not strategic—it’s risky. A proactive strategy does more than prevent problems. It positions your business as reliable, forward-thinking, and built to last. ✔ It ensures operations keep moving, even when challenges arise. ✔ It builds trust by showing clients you plan ahead, not patch after. If you're waiting for something to go wrong before taking action, that’s not caution. That’s gambling with your business. #Cybersecurity #ProactiveDefense #MSPs #SMBsecurity #CyberLeadership