Skip to main content
  • The CBI chevron_right
  • How your business can respond to heightened cyber threat

How your business can respond to heightened cyber threat

Cyber threats were already rising up risk registers, but with Russian attacks on Ukraine the threat level is currently heightened. So what can businesses do to protect themselves?

10 Mar 2022, 2 min read

Speaking on the latest CBI @10am webinar, Paul Maddison, Director for National Resilience and Strategy at the National Cyber Security Centre, urged businesses to look at two pieces of guidance on the NCSC website.

  1. On ransomware – the main threat to UK businesses, which could get worse if Russia fails to clamp down on criminal gangs
  2. On how businesses can respond to the current heightened risk, with specific short-term measures people can take to protect themselves.

Firms can also sign up to NCSC’s early warning service through its website. 

While Maddison said there was a low likelihood of a direct, deliberate disruptive attack from Russia on the UK in response to sanctions, he warned of “spill over” because of the complexity of supply chains. Russia has deployed both distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks and wiper malware (designed to destroy information on computers) in Ukraine. These are aimed at disruption and can’t be contained within geographical borders. Some companies in Latvia and Lithuania have already been affected because of connected networks.  

“In the longer term, this crisis has shown that resilience is massively strategically important,” said Maddison. “And we’re not as resilient as we need to be on cyber resilience – there’s a need for effort across the board to improve that on the medium to long term.”

For more information on how to reduce the cyber security risks facing your business, read this LinkedIn blog from Susannah Odell, the CBI’s Head of Digital Policy. 

And for the latest intelligence on what the Ukraine crisis means for your business, listen back to the CBI @10am webinar.