What are some practical and proactive steps organizations can take to improve their security posture?
In support of Cybersecurity Awareness Month, we are spotlighting the critical areas where organizations must elevate their cybersecurity strategies for 2025 and beyond. The focus of this article is on breach preparedness.
In the aftermath of a cybersecurity breach, organizations identify critical gaps that could have dramatically reduced their impact, recovery time, and overall costs.
This article shares decades of response team experience and post-incident analysis, highlighting 5 of the top preparations companies wish they’d implemented before a breach.
These aren’t exotic technologies, they’re proven practices that transform organizations from reactive to proactive security postures. These preparations represent the difference between a manageable incident and potential business-threatening catastrophes.
1. Incident Response Plan (IRP)
A written incident response plan provides step-by-step procedures, decision trees, and resource inventories that enable coordinated response rapidly without wasting critical time resolving conflicting approaches under pressure. Key components include contact information, a decision matrix, incident classification, procedures and templates.
An effective IRP should include input from all relevant stakeholders and be specific enough to guide action, yet flexible enough for unique circumstances
2. Tabletop Exercises
An untested IRP may be unhelpful when needed most. Regular testing reveals gaps, builds team competence, and transforms procedures into practiced capabilities.
Effective testing progresses scenario complexity over time to gradually build team capabilities and confidence. Tests should include practical aspects of scenarios such as password changes or network isolation steps. Post-exercise reviews identify lessons learned and drive plan improvements.
3. Cyber Insurance
Cyber insurance has evolved from a convenience to an essential risk management tool. Beyond financial protection, modern cyber insurance policies provide access to specialized incident response resources, legal expertise, and recovery services that many organizations cannot maintain in-house.
Organizations should carefully assess coverage limits, exclusions, and requirements. Many policies mandate specific security controls and preparedness measures, creating positive reinforcement for good cybersecurity practices. Regular policy reviews ensure coverage keeps pace with organizational growth and evolving threat landscapes. Misrepresented controls in cyber insurance application/renewal forms can result in denied claims.
4. Logging, Alerting and Detection
Logs provide the digital forensic foundation for incident investigation informing response efforts. Without proper logging, organizations operate blindly during critical moments. Settings should be adjusted from defaults to increase log details and volume to include network traffic, system logs, security logs and user activity.
Active monitoring transforms data into actionable intelligence for early threat detection and rapid response. Success requires tuned detection rules, balanced alert thresholds, and trained personnel to reduce blind spots and minimize false positives.
5. Pentesting
Penetration testing simulates sophisticated attacks to provide actionable intelligence that enables risk-based prioritization over theoretical severity scores. Organizations should go beyond compliance and perform preventative assessments to identify exploitable vulnerabilities, exceptions and attack paths for prioritized remediation.
Regular testing establishes security maturity baselines, demonstrates ROI to executives, and transforms cybersecurity from cost center to competitive advantage while strengthening insurance and compliance positions. By revealing vulnerabilities before attackers find them, validating controls under realistic conditions, and building response capabilities, strategic penetration testing helps organizations thrive despite cyber threats.
From Regret to Resilience
The question is not whether an organization will face a cyber incident, but whether they will be prepared when it happens. These 5 preparations are the collective wisdom of organizations that have experienced cyber incidents and emerged stronger. Their regrets have become our roadmap to thrive in an increasingly digital world where cybersecurity resilience has become a defining characteristic of successful enterprises.
The best time to implement these controls was yesterday. The second-best time is today.
This article is part of a series highlighting the critical areas where organizations must elevate their cybersecurity strategies for 2025 and beyond. Additional articles include:
- AI Governance in 2025: 3 Key Strategies to Protect Your Business and Stay Compliant
- Did You Use a Password to Login Today? You’re Set Up for Failure!
How Can Schneider Downs Help?
For more information about implementing these cybersecurity preparations in your organization, or to access additional resources and tools, please contact our cybersecurity consulting team at [email protected].
About Cybersecurity Awareness Month
Since 2004, the United States and Congress have recognized October as Cybersecurity Awareness Month to raise awareness about the importance of cybersecurity in the public and private sectors and tribal communities. With a focus on securing our world, Cybersecurity Awareness Month recognizes the importance of taking daily action to reduce risks when online and connected to devices.
Related Resources
- CISA Cybersecurity Awareness Month Resource Center
- CISA Cybersecurity Awareness Month 2025 Toolkit
- Schneider Downs Cybersecurity Resource Library
About Schneider Downs Cybersecurity
The Schneider Downs cybersecurity practice consists of experts offering a comprehensive set of information technology security services, including penetration testing, intrusion prevention/detection review, ransomware security, vulnerability assessments and a robust digital forensics and incident response team. In addition, our Digital Forensics and Incident Response teams are available 24x7x365 at 1-800-993-8937 if you suspect or are experiencing a network incident of any kind.
To learn more, visit our dedicated Cybersecurity page.
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