Majo Micovic, CEO of Sky Express: It’s Important to Understand the Prime Movers and Trends in Cyber Security Solutions to Fully Utilize Investments in IS Safety

When it comes to digital transformation and security, one of the main problems we will face is the lack of a trained staff and adequate internal resources, says Majo Micovic, the CEO of the company Sky Express. He says that it’s important to understand the prime movers and trends in cyber security solutions to fully utilize investments in IS safety. He also reveals the two critical factors and presents some of the new solutions.

The systems of defense of corporate digital data are increasingly complex, following the development of attack techniques. To what extent do the usual practices of cooperation and coordination within corporate teams follow those changes?

– According to the latest survey done by PricewaterhouseCoopers, more than a third of the surveyed members of the boards of the leading companies, as well as CEOs, are not sure about the capacities of internal IT security resources and the ability of those resources to define and clearly point to the security problems in keeping vital digital data in a timely fashion. That is one of the indicators for a special subject: how big the capacities of IT security team for adequate reporting on potential threats are and what they are like.

The distribution of logs or a simple SIEM analytics are not acceptable ways of communication toward companies’ management structures.

There are two critical factors: the capability and the resources of the IT security team to monitor and predict problems, as well as the capacity of the managements of those teams to later vertically inform the leaderships of the companies on the degree of security, the planned activities, the trends and the budgeting of the next steps.

Unfortunately, the practice shows that the implementation of new solutions in fact increasingly frequently overload IT security teams, that there’s a lack of human capacities, especially well-educated and experienced leaders of such teams (CISO and similar), who would, in addition to a strong technical background, also have a complementary business capacity, sufficient to recompose a whole host of technical findings and information into the sort of business information that the high management finds useful.

As one of the latest solutions, the so-called vCISO, that is, a virtual CISO, has appeared. This, then, is an outsourced capacity that companies are beginning to hire, “buying” such a service from the leading cyber security service providers.

This way, companies solve at least two important tasks: they have at their disposal a standing expert for the issues of IT security technical operations and, at the same time, a reliable and competent “translator” of complex systemic data into practical, clear parameters for deciding on the company’s operations.

What is the influence of information security in the era of digital transformation?

– In the past few years, most companies have accelerated the tempo of their digital transformation based on the adoption of the leading ICT technologies such as cloud/edge computing, Big Data and the Internet of Things (IoT). At the same time, organizations still experience security attacks, which are among the most important obstacles to the execution of their digital transformation plans.

The well-known ransomware attack that happened this year, “WannaCry”, has had an impact on big organizations worldwide, such as the National Health Service (NHS) of Great Britain. Another example is the fake cyber attack on the SWIFT system of international transactions, which happened in February 2016 and resulted in the theft of USD 81 million from the Central Bank of Bangladesh.



These attacks expose the vulnerability of modern cyber infrastructures, as well as the importance of cyber security as an integral element of the strategy of an organization’s digital transformation. It’s important to understand the prime movers and trends in cyber security solutions to fully utilize investments in safety.

So, the era of digital transformation has not just increased the importance of information security, but also introduced new game rules, which have become a trend in modern business. Classic AV solutions are therefore no longer sufficient, so the new standard in the protection of endpoint systems are NGAV (Next Generation Anti-Virus) solutions with attack detection and response (EDR – Endpoint Detection and Response).

Also, it is no longer enough to have a good WEB app, but it also needs to be further protected with a WAF solution, and it is not enough to have data on a cloud, but they need to be additionally encrypted etc.

How aware are our companies of cyber risks?

– When it comes to the awareness of companies of cyber risks, it is difficult to generalize. Even within the sectors that are regulated in detail, such as the sectors of banking or insurance, there are differences in the approach and the realization of information security measures between individual participants.

The increasingly intensive digital transformation will certainly result in an increased risk from potential attacks and abuses, which will require a faster, more adequate and more efficient response to that risk.

One of the main problems we will face is the lack of trained staff and adequate internal resources. In that sense, it is likely that there will be an increase in the provision of services of information security and Managed Security Services (MSSP), which is the most efficient and financially most adequate way of reducing and removing risks.

Sky Express d.o.o. Beograd

PricewaterhouseCoopers d.o.o. Beograd

Sky Express

PricewaterhouseCoopers

Majo Mićović

corporate digital data defense systems

distribution of logs

SIEM analytics

CISO

vCISO

virtual CISO

information security

digital transformation

ICT technologies

ransomware attack

WannaCry

NGAV

EDR

WAF solution

Cloud

cyber risk

MSSP

special edition newsletter

eWorld at a click