IT Compliance and Controls

COBIT 5 exposure draft is out for review, so sharpen those pencils, order that Grande with an add shot, and find someplace quiet and dig into this design document (note this is NOT Cobit 5.0 but instead the plan at which will be employed to create it.  It is critical to review and provide feedback [...]

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In the Wall Street Journal and on several online resources there is documented evidence that an information attack was launched against the country of Georgia and its government systems.  This attack coincided with the Russian offensive.  The implications of this attack are tremendous and shift the theory beyond information cyberwarfare to practical lessons.  A few [...]

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There have been recent success in research efforts (mostly academic and theory in origin and a few recently progressing into the more exploitative POC) to identify weaknesses that exist in everything from Firewire connections to the magnetic cards used to access secure facilities.  These proofs of concepts highlight the necessity of a well deployed control [...]

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On Sunday a foreign government enforced its sovereign right to censor its citizens, and consequently caused a global outage (2 hours) to the most popular video side in the planet, run by the most sophisticated global internet company - Google.  The lessons here resonate with the need for organizations to consider all aspects of risk [...]

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Intellectual property for an organization can vary between trade secrets (i.e. the ’secret sauce recipe’) and customer specific data.  Every organization must classify information appropriately based on their own usage of the data, governing laws, and best practices.  Two recent examples caught my attention as examples where data was compromised and the affects.
The first is [...]

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The criticality of the Internet has grown exponentially. Consumers rely on Internet based applications (or RIA) for everything from email, CRM, ERP, publishing - and this online portal. Businesses have generally transitioned from dedicated frame relays, and leased lines to VPN tunnels through the Internet (link to Cisco Whitepaper). The efficiency gained [...]

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The need for organizations to define and communicate effective policies and procedures resonates around the globe, and is strongly supported by such governance organizations to include the WTO, The World Bank, OCEG, and the OECD, to name but a few. A first, but essential, step to ensuring appropriate controls and operational efficiency is the [...]

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Personally Identifiable Information is defined differently by each industry, country, and region. Companies must have information intelligence practices in place that account for these types of information, and means of classifying and protecting. Such information in the U.S. varies by jurisdiction, but can include medical records, financial information, and now perhaps in the [...]

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In my book, IT Compliance and Controls, I highlight the importance of the energy infrastructure, and the risks that these systems face given their newly interconnectedness. To highlight the relevant points from the book - the energy infrastructures of the world support the medical, HVAC, security, and financial systems of our economies. The [...]

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The annual 2007 Socha-Gelbmann Electronic Discovery Survey has been released and is a great resource for vetting your current internal approach to managing data, and providing a quick guide for establishing a relationship based on industry opinion.
Interesting facts include - market share, expertise in legal aspects of e-discovery, tools, and more.  A prime component of [...]

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