All news with #ciso tag

Why Chief Trust Officers Are Emerging and How CISOs Fit

🤝 Organizations are creating a chief trust officer (CTrO) to elevate trust as a business differentiator, responding to breaches, product-safety worries and AI-related uncertainty. The CTrO typically complements the CISO by focusing on reputation, ethics, transparency and customer confidence while CISOs retain technical controls, incident response and security operations. Leaders stress the role must produce measurable outcomes and avoid becoming mere 'trust theatre' by tracking signals such as customer sentiment, retention and external certifications.

How CISOs Can Transition Between Industries Successfully

🧭 Successful cross-industry moves for CISOs require reframing technical experience as demonstrable business impact. Executives often assume security leaders are industry‑locked, but practitioners such as Marc Ashworth and Tim Youngblood show that a background in consulting, active participation in ISACs, and strong risk‑management fundamentals translate across sectors. Recruiters advise emphasizing measurable outcomes, targeting structurally similar industries, and leveraging client relationships to bridge credibility gaps. Avoid being pigeonholed by clearly linking past achievements to the goals of the prospective organization.

Internal Conflicts Often Worse Than Cyberattacks for CISOs

🛡️ Roughly 70% of senior security leaders say internal conflicts during a cyber crisis cause more disruption than the attack itself, according to the Cytactic 2025 State of Cyber Incident Response Management (CIRM) Report. The survey of 480 US cybersecurity executives highlights blurred authority, poor communication, and unrehearsed roles that delay response. Experts recommend demonstrating security's business value, reducing operational friction with passwordless controls, and aligning incentives with lines of business.

CISO Role Expands: From Operator to Enterprise Risk Lead

🔒 The CISO role has evolved from a primarily technical post into a broad enterprise leadership responsibility. Foundry’s 2025 Security Priorities Study shows many security leaders now brief boards multiple times a month and oversee areas beyond cybersecurity, including risk, compliance, privacy, and AI oversight. This shift requires stronger strategic communication and executive influence in addition to operational expertise.

CISO GenAI Board Presentation Template and Guidance

🛡️Keep Aware has published a free Template for CISO GenAI Presentations designed to help security leaders brief boards or AI committees. The template centers on four agenda items—GenAI Adoption, Risk Landscape, Risk Exposure and Incidents, and Governance and Controls—and recommends visuals and dashboard-style metrics to translate technical issues into business risk. It also emphasizes browser-level monitoring to prevent data leakage and enforce policies.

How CISOs Identify and Reject Poor Security Products

🔍 CISOs increasingly face a torrent of vendor pitches and must probe beyond marketing to find tools that genuinely improve security. Experienced security leaders recommend five core questions about business fit, operational impact, integration and maintenance, update cadence, and concrete use cases. They emphasize live demos and practitioner testing so teams can spot technical gaps and avoid products that merely add noise. Be wary of vague claims, fearmongering, buzzword-heavy pitches, or vendors who resist feedback.

Ten Career Pitfalls That Can Derail Today's CISOs Now

🔒 CISOs face many behavioral and strategic traps that can stall or end careers if not addressed. Leaders, coaches and consultants identify ten common mistakes — from failing to align security with business priorities and treating security as a pure technology function, to reflexively saying no, enforcing rigid rules, misunderstanding AI, lacking transparency, not networking, and mishandling incidents. The article emphasizes becoming an enabler, tying controls to ROI, communicating clearly, and rehearsing response plans to build resilience.

Justifying Security Investments: A Boardroom Guide

💡 CISOs must present security spending as business enablers that reduce risk, protect revenue, and support strategic priorities rather than as purely technical upgrades. Begin by defining the business challenge, then tie the proposed solution—such as Zero Trust or platform consolidation—to measurable outcomes like reduced incident impact, faster recovery, and lower TCO. Use cost models, breach scenarios, per-user economics, and timelines to quantify benefits and speak the board’s language of risk, return, and shareholder value.

Is the CISO Role Broken? Rethinking Security Leadership

🧭 The article argues that the modern CISO role has become unmanageable for many practitioners and often fails to deliver meaningful, long-term change. It traces causes to short tenures, technologist backgrounds, and siloed corporate governance, and advocates splitting responsibilities by creating a senior CSO focused on business protection while returning the CISO to a technical, execution-oriented remit. The author urges CISOs to rebuild trust through demonstrable delivery rather than constant demands, and suggests this structural change will improve governance, tenure, and recruitment.

Lack of Board Access Drives CISO Job Dissatisfaction

🛡️ Cybersecurity leaders say board engagement is essential, but many CISOs—particularly in small and mid‑market organizations—report minimal or no access to full boards, according to a 2025 report from IANS and Artico Search. That lack of access strongly correlates with job dissatisfaction and short tenures. Experts recommend strengthening C‑suite relationships and framing cyber risk in business terms to secure board support.

Nine Common Mistakes That Can Cost CISOs Their Jobs

🔒 This article outlines nine critical errors that can cost CISOs their positions, based on input from several industry leaders. It highlights risks such as overconfidence, unnecessary complexity, weak Governance, Risk & Compliance programs, and poor alignment with business priorities. The piece stresses practical prevention: prioritize access control and identity management, address the human factor, shrink stale data, break down silos, and avoid complacency to reduce breach risk and maintain executive trust.

What I Wish I Knew Before Becoming a CISO — Advice

🔒 Drawing on a Black Hat panel and an eclectic career spanning Unix administration, MSSP operations, and multiple roles at Fortinet, the author distills practical guidance for aspiring and new CISOs. Key points stress that the role is not purely technical but a business resilience function demanding clear, data-driven communication, calendar discipline, and strong team building. The post also highlights burnout risks and the critical need for D&O insurance and legal preparedness.