Supply chains are intricate meshes of connected networks. From procurement to last-mile delivery, multiple networks owned by different stakeholders talk to each other while ensuring product delivery times are met.
By sharing IoT and other shipment tracking data across systems, visibility into supply chains has increased considerably in recent years, and upgraded networks have led to a rise in efficiency and less waste. However, as visibility has increased, so has the risk of cyberattacks.
Increased data sharing and transparency between stakeholders has, in parallel, increased the opportunities for breaching systems. It’s especially attractive to malicious actors, simply because security compromises in one area of the supply chain has the potential to result in a cascading effect that jeopardizes the entire network.
Rolling back interconnected systems is not an option, given the massive benefits that vendors and consumers have realized. Here are five ways companies can mitigate the security risks emanating from highly interconnected systems.
Adopt continuous monitoring
Continuous security validation, or CSV monitoring, is the best way to review and refine your security posture. A CSV platform leverages AI to repeatedly simulate attacks against your system and identifies vulnerabilities.
One of the reasons this approach is effective is because CSV follows the approach many attackers adopt.
Attackers routinely hack and compromise static security postures by learning of their weaknesses. CSV reduces the likelihood of a compromise by dynamically discovering and strengthening your security stance. The result is a robust system that automatically validates your strength against different attack vectors.
While CSV won’t protect you from internal compromise, it will ensure common entry locations will remain robust.
Schedule regular pentests
Penetration testing, or pentesting, often receives a bad rap due to its highly structured nature. While pentests can miss the mark if conducted poorly, a good pentest will reveal many flaws in your system. For instance, pentests can reveal deep system configuration errors that could compromise your network.
When scheduling pentests, make sure you simulate specific scenarios. For instance, you could simulate the compromise of an upstream system in the supply chain that sends you corrupted data. How can your logistics and tracking systems nullify the threat while protecting client data? Pentests must have a clear objective and KPIs that allow you to measure success or failure.
Pentests often go off the rails when red teams deviate from the plan and begin exploring other issues. Note different issues but stick to the plan at all times. Conduct thorough reviews after the test to ensure your security teams are on the same page.
Conduct security audits regularly
Security audits are often executed as an afterthought at most companies. They consume valuable resources and are thus understandably pushed down the list of priorities. In a fast-paced supply chain-dependent company, a security audit might miss rapidly changing data and serve no purpose.
However, instead of eliminating or minimizing security audits, you must automate them and define clear scopes. For instance, a daily smoke test must be a part of your security audit. Weekly sanity tests and pentest results can come together to give your security teams a full view of the state of your security posture.
When combined with CSV monitoring, your security teams will have enough data to flush out any weaknesses within your systems. Pay special attention to third party vendor data feeds, since they are often a source of corruption.
If you’re transferring data to another stakeholder, make sure your feeds are encrypted. Secure your network’s endpoints so that malware in other systems doesn’t affect your network. Inspect these endpoints regularly as part of your audit.
Enforce security standards
Enforcing security standards on your network is simple. However, to secure your supply chain data, you must enforce standards throughout your value chain. For instance, vendors connecting to your network could compromise your security by unwittingly introducing malware.
The best approach to this situation is to educate and enforce encryption standards, amongst other practices. Ensure cybersecurity is a part of every contract you sign. For instance, include cybersecurity standards clauses in your contracts with pricing and delivery standards to communicate their importance.
Smaller vendors might struggle to comply with your standards. In such cases, you could offer them secure portal access and connections to upload data before importing them to your system. This way, you can validate everything entering your network’s core.
When running security audits, ask for vendor data, since their security postures affect you too. Vendor non-compliance in this regard must be a part of quality score calculations. A vendor that delivers goods on time but fails to maintain security compliance will compromise your company at some point.
Use bug bounties
Cybersecurity is ever-changing, and bug bounties are one of the best ways of keeping pace with changes.
The truth is that most supply chain companies are not built with data security in mind from the ground up. As a result, cybersecurity is seen as a non-core business function, which can lead to security lapses.
While investing heavily in infrastructure and employees is one solution, a bug bounty brings potentially malicious actors onto your side. By incentivizing people to hack your system and reveal weaknesses, you uncover attack vectors that your security system missed.
Bug bounties might be expensive, but they will save you money in the long run thanks to saving you from reputational harm. Invest in bug bounties, and you’ll manage to uncover weaknesses that could potentially cripple your systems.
Ever-changing landscape
Security threats change all the time, and you must evolve to keep pace. The methods in this article are a combination of static and dynamic tactics that strengthen your systems and ensure attackers never gain a foothold. Given the sensitive nature of supply chain data on your systems, the time to invest in these methods is right now.
