Protecting the Cyber Supply Chain

Posted: December 6th, 2015

By Jon Oltsik

Jon Oltsik is the Senior Principal Analyst, Enterprise Strategy Group. The ESG Research Report, Cyber Supply Chain Security Revisited, examines cyber supply chain security in the U.S. critical infrastructure.

Critical infrastructure organizations have large and complex IT networks built on top of an assortment of heterogeneous technologies. Many large enterprises also extend their in-house IT assets to an external web of connected business partners, customers, outsourcers, and suppliers. This multifaceted amalgamation of participants is sometimes known as the cyber supply chain which ESG (Enterprise Strategy Group) defines as: “The entire set of key actors involved with or using cyber infrastructure: system end-users, policy makers, acquisition specialists, business partners, system integrators, network providers, and software/hardware suppliers, etc.”

Cybersecurity principles and best practices are typically applied to internal applications, networks, and systems as large organizations seek to mitigate risk and detect/respond to cyber-attacks. Many enterprises are actually bolstering their internal defenses – ESG research indicates that 57 percent of organizations increased their cybersecurity spending in 2015.

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