Computer Forensics

So you had a customer data security breach last weekend? Do you know you could be held liable in court for failing to implement required security procedures? That’s right. Due to the overwhelming surge in identity theft wherein nearly 20 million Americans have already been affected, most states have enacted laws to curtail this fast rising crime. Therefore, it is important to redefine how your company deals with customer data security.

  • First, you’ll want to know what your obligations are as dictated by law. Some places, for example, require the destruction or deletion of personal data through shredding, erasing, or by rendering them undecipherable.
  • Second, not only do you need to comply with the said requirements, you’ll also have to prove in court that you actually complied if ever a security breach does happen.
  • Third, you need to be aware of your post-breach duties to avoid being dealt additional penalties.

Obviously, such situations now call for individuals who are experts in both the legal and technical aspects regarding data security. Such individuals are practitioners of a relatively new discipline known as computer forensics.

Armed with our computer forensics specialists, we’ll be able to help you deal with the above concerns. As a result, you can be prevented from having to pay fines that can go up to hundreds of thousands of euros.

There are other equally important reasons why you would want to avail of computer forensics services. For example, you’ll need computer forensics specialists because you want to:

  • Catch a person involved in criminal activities such as child porn, stealing of personal data, and destroying intellectual property.
  • Investigate a computer, network, or even a mobile device for clues that may lead to the culprit.
  • Determine the extent and possible causes when you discover your digital data has been damaged.
  • Find and recover damaged, deleted or encrypted data regardless of whether the cause was intentional or not. If the data in question will be used as evidence in a legal action, there are certain procedures that need to be followed during recovery operations to retain the integrity of the data. Computer forensic specialists are highly qualified for such operations.
  • Implement security policies in your organisation. Such policies have to operate within legal bounds if you want to avoid possible sanctions in the future. These policies should also be designed such that future forensic operations can be conducted with a high likelihood of success.

That said, a company that integrates computer forensics into its IT security policies and practices will be better equipped to remedy the situation once data security has already been compromised than a company that doesn’t.

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Matrix Management: Benefits and Pitfalls

Matrix management brings together managers and employees from different departments to collaborate with each other towards the accomplishment of the organizational goals. As much as it is beneficial, matrix management also has limitations. Hence, companies should understand its benefits and pitfalls before implementing this management technique.

Benefits

The following are some of the advantages of matrix management:

Effective Communication of Information

Because of the hybrid nature of the matrix structure, it enables different departments to closely work together and communicate frequently in order to solve project issues. This leads to a proficient information exchange among leaders and subordinates. Consequently, it results to developed strategies, enhanced performance and quick productivity.

Efficient Use of Resources

Resources can be used efficiently in the organisation since it can be shared among functions and projects. As the communication line is more open, the valuable knowledge and highly skilled resources are easily distributed within the organisation.

Increased Motivation

The matrix structure promotes democracy. And with the employees working on a team, they are motivated to perform their duties better. The opinions and expertise of the employees are brought to the table and considered by the managers before they make decisions. This leads to employee satisfaction, empowerment and improved performance.

Flexibility

Since the employees communicate with each other more frequently, decision making becomes speedy and response is adaptive. They can easily adjust with diverse situations that the company encounters.

Skills Development

Matrix employees are pooled out for work assignments, even to projects that are not necessarily in line with their skill background. With this approach to management, employees have the chance to widen their skills and expertise.

Discipline Retention

One significant advantage of matrix management is that it enables the employees to maintain their skills in functional areas while working with multidisciplinary projects. Once the project is completed and the team wraps up, the members remain sharp in their discipline technically and return to their home functions.

Pitfalls

Here are some disadvantages of matrix management:

Power Struggle

In the matrix structure, there is always tension between the functional and project manager. Although their intent is polite, their conflicting demands and competition for control over the same resources make it more difficult.

Internal Complexity

Having more than one manager, the employees might become confused to who their immediate leader is. The dual authority can lead to internal complexity and possible communication problems. Worst, employee dissatisfaction and high employee turnover.

Heightened Conflict

In any given situation where people and resources are shared across projects, there would always be competition and conflict. When these issues are prolonged, conflicts will heightened and will lead to more internal problems.

Increased Stress

For the employees, being part of a matrix structure can be stressful. Their commitment is divided among the projects and their relationship with multiple managers requires various adjustments. Increased stress can negatively affect their performance in the long run.

Excessive Overhead Expenses

Overhead administrative costs, such as salaries, increase in a matrix structure. More expenses, more burden to the organisation. This is a challenge to matrix management that leaders should consider carefully.

These are just some of the advantages and disadvantages of matrix management. The list could go on, depending on the unique circumstances that organisations have. The key is that when you decide to implement matrix management, you should recognise how to take full advantage of its benefits and understand how to lessen, if not eradicate, the pitfalls of this approach to management.

9 Cloud Security Questions you need to ask Service Providers

Companies in Ireland and the UK who are considering cloud adoption might already have a general idea of the security risks inherent in cloud computing. However, since different providers may not offer the same levels of risk mitigation, it is important to know which providers can give sufficient assurance on cloud security.

Here are 10 cloud security questions to ask service providers vying for your attention.

1. Where will my data be located?

There are a variety of reasons why you will want to ask this question. One big reason is that there are certain countries that don’t have strict legislation (or any legislation at all) pertaining to cloud computing. In that case, the provider won’t be as motivated to apply high levels of risk mitigation.

So if your data is hosted off shore, then you might want to reconsider or at least conduct a deeper study regarding the security conditions there.

2. Do you have provisions for regulatory compliance?

Certain standards and regulations (e.g. PCI DSS and possibly the EU Data Protection Directive) have specific guidelines pertaining to data stored in the cloud. If your organisation is covered by any of these legislation, then you need to know whether your provider can help you meet requirements for compliance.

3. Who will have access to my data?

In a cloud environment, where your data is going to be managed by people who aren’t under your direct supervision, you’ll have to worry as much about internal threats as you would with external threats.

Therefore, you need to know how many individuals will have access to your data. You also need to know relevant information such as how admins and technicians with data access rights are screened prior to getting hired. You also need to determine what access controls are being implemented.

4. How is data segregated?

Since there will be other clients, you will want to know how your data is going to be segregated from theirs. Is there any possibility of an accidental or intentional data breach due to poor data segregation? Find out if your data is going to be encrypted and how strong the encryption algorithm is.

5. How will you support investigative activities?

Sometimes, even if strong cloud security measures are in place, a data breach can still happen. If it does happen, the provider should have ways to track each user/administrator’s activity that can sufficiently support a detailed data forensics investigation.

Find out whether logs are being kept and how detailed they are.

6. Are we protected by a Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity plan? How?

Don’t be fooled by sales talk of 100% up-time. Even the most robust cloud infrastructures can suffer outages too. But the important thing is that, when they do fail, they should be able to get up and running in the soonest time possible.

Don’t just ask about their guaranteed RPOs and RTOs. Find out whether your data and applications will be replicated across multiple sites. Unless the provider says they will be, you need to find a provider with a better infrastructure.

7. Can I get copies of my VMs?

In a cloud infrastructure, your servers are actually in the form of files known as virtual machines (VMs). Because VMs are just files, they should be easily copied. There may be issues though, like the VMs might be stored in a not-so-popular proprietary format. Another possible issue is that the provider may simply not allow copying.

Having copies of your VMs can be useful should you later on decide to transfer to another provider or even duplicate your cloud infrastructure on your own.

8. What will happen to my data when I scale down?

One outstanding benefit of cloud computing is that when your business demands drop, you can easily scale down computing resources and reduce your cloud spending. ?But what will happen to your data when you decommission virtual servers? Will they be discarded?

You might want your data to be retained up to a certain period. On the other hand, you might also want them to be deleted immediately. Ask about the provider’s data deletion/data retention policies and see if they are in line with yours.

9. What will happen to my data if I decide to close my account?

There might come a time when you’ll want to terminate your contract with your cloud provider. Just like in issue #8, you’ll want to find out more about data deletion/data retention policies.

Although some providers can give you detailed answers, many of these answers can include a lot of technical jargon that can leave you totally confused. If you want someone you can trust to:

  • simplify those answers;
  • help you pick the right cloud service provider, and
  • even make sure cloud security is really upheld once your cloud engagement is ?under way

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Why Spreadsheets can send the Pillars of Solvency II Crashing Down


Solvency II is now fast approaching and while it may provide added protection to policy holders, its impact on the insurance industry is not all a bed of roses. Expect insurance companies to restructure, increase manpower, and raise spending on actuarial operations and risk management initiatives. Those that cannot, will have to go. But what have spreadsheets got to do with all these?

Well, spreadsheets aren’t really the main casts in this blockbuster of a regulatory exercise but they certainly have a significant supporting role to play. Pillar I of Solvency II, which calls for improved supervision on internal control, risk management, and corporate governance, and Pillar II, which tackles supervisory reporting and public disclosure of financial and other relevant information, both affect systems that have high-reliance on spreadsheets.

A little background about spreadsheets might help.

Who needs an IT solution when you can have spreadsheets?

Everyone in any organisation just love spreadsheets; from the office clerk to the CEO. Because they’re so easy to use (not to mention they’re a staple in office computers), people employ them for processing numbers and as an all-around tool for planning, forecasting, reporting, complex modelling, market data analysis, and so on. They make such tasks faster and easier. Really?

You probably haven’t heard of spreadsheet hell

Unfortunately, spreadsheets do have certain shortcomings. Due to their inherent structure and lack of controls, it is so easy to commit simple errors like an accidental copy paste, an omission of a negative sign, an incorrect data input, or an unintentional deletion. Such shortcomings may seem harmless until your shareholders discover a multi-million discrepancy in your financial report.

And because spreadsheet errors can go undetected for a long time, they are constant targets of fraudsters. In other words, spreadsheets are high risk applications.

Solvency II Impact on Spreadsheet-based Financial and IT Systems

Regulations like Solvency II, are aimed at reducing risks to manageable levels. Basically, Solvency II is a risk-based system wherein a company?s capital requirements will depend on its measured riskiness. If companies want to avoid facing onerous capital requirements, they have to comply.

The three pillars of Solvency II have to be in place. Now, since spreadsheets (also known as User Developed Applications or UDAs) are high-risk applications with weak control features and prone to produce inaccurate reports, companies will have a lot of work to do to establish Pillars II and III.

There are at least 8 articles that impact spreadsheets in the directive. Article 82, for example, which requires firms to ensure a high level of data quality and accuracy, strikes at the very core of spreadsheets? weakness.

A whitepaper by Raymond Panko entitled ?Spreadsheets and Sarbanes-Oxley: Regulations, Risks, and Control Frameworks? mentioned that 94% of audited real world operational spreadsheets that were included in his study were found to have errors and that an average of 5.2% of all cells in the audited spreadsheets had errors.

Furthermore, many articles in the directive call for the enforcement of better documentation. This is one thing that’s very tedious and almost unrealistic to do with spreadsheets because just about anyone uses them. Besides, with different ‘versions? of the same data existing in different workstations throughout the organisation, it would be extremely difficult to keep track of them all.

Because of spreadsheets you now need an IT solution

It is clear that, with the growing number of regulations and the mounting complexity of tasks needed for compliance, spreadsheets no longer belong in this era. What you need is a server-based solution that allows for seamless collaboration, data reliability, data consistency, increased security, automatic consolidation, and all the other features that make regulation compliance more doable.

One important ingredient for achieving Solvency II compliance is sound data risk management. Sad to say, the ubiquitous spreadsheet will only expose your data to more risks.

More Spreadsheet Blogs


Spreadsheet Risks in Banks


Top 10 Disadvantages of Spreadsheets


Disadvantages of Spreadsheets – obstacles to compliance in the Healthcare Industry


How Internal Auditors can win the War against Spreadsheet Fraud


Spreadsheet Reporting – No Room in your company in an age of Business Intelligence


Still looking for a Way to Consolidate Excel Spreadsheets?


Disadvantages of Spreadsheets


Spreadsheet woes – ill equipped for an Agile Business Environment


Spreadsheet Fraud


Spreadsheet Woes – Limited features for easy adoption of a control framework


Spreadsheet woes – Burden in SOX Compliance and other Regulations


Spreadsheet Risk Issues


Server Application Solutions – Don’t let Spreadsheets hold your Business back


Why Spreadsheets can send the pillars of Solvency II crashing down

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