The Cyber Defense eMagazine March Edition for 2024

strategy, and encouraging cross-functional collaboration to reach and maintain tailored security
objectives, federal agencies can better navigate the evolving threat landscape in the months ahead.
Stop Chasing Cyber Perfection
In 2024, rather than concentrating solely on shoring up individual layers of security, agencies must focus
on building a comprehensive security posture that encompasses the entire IT ecosystem – prioritizing
progress over perfection. For example, instead of working to perfectly shore up each pillar of CISA’s Zero
Trust Maturity Model (identity, devices, networks, applications and workloads, and data), agencies should
first take a step back and identify where their greatest vulnerabilities lie across pillars. Then, implement
measures to address those weaknesses accordingly.
Moving away from a linear, perfection-centric mindset towards a proactive and adaptive approach can
help CIOs shift from a checklist mentality to a more sustainable strategy that addresses multiple security
facets simultaneously. This not only affords agencies a greater ROI on their cybersecurity investments
(enabling them to more quickly quantify successes across a larger margin), but it also goes a long way
in shoring up agencies’ expansive attack surface as the digital landscape evolves and widens.
Adopting a more customizable, holistic approach also enables agencies to think more proactively when
it comes to risk mitigation and breach containment. In Zero Trust terms, we like to call this adopting an
“assume breach” mindset, which actively encourages agencies to put solutions in place to minimize a
breach’s impact when it inevitably occurs. This ensures that regardless of where a breach originates –
an endpoint device, a vulnerable network, a compromised cloud environment – attackers cannot move
unimpeded across sensitive IT infrastructure.
By focusing on incremental progress and adopting an “assume breach” mindset, agencies reap
numerous benefits, including ensuring that everyday attacks don’t turn into mission-impacting breaches.
Additional strategies, like ensuring cross-agency visibility, strategic asset segmentation, and the use of
tools and practices for comprehensive threat modelling and understanding, are also crucial for effective
and lasting resilience.
Cyber Resilience is Not One-Size-Fits-All
Rejecting the notion of a “one-size-fits-all” approach to security is paramount in fostering effective cyber
resilience, especially for federal agencies. Rather than seeking a singular, universal solution, it’s essential
that agencies prioritize strategic enablers like visibility, and embrace a customized approach that aligns
with the specific needs and vulnerabilities of their organization.
Stagnation in cybersecurity can leave agencies vulnerable to threats, highlighting the necessity for an
ongoing approach that allows for continuous learning and evolution. By starting small, and by building
basic cybersecurity hygiene practices into more facets of the organization, agencies can boost their cyber
resilience across the board. This can include:
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