Neural Newscast

Welcome to Prime Cyber Insights. I'm Noah Feldman. Today, we're looking at how the digital economy is really reshaping the hierarchy of the corporate office. For years, cybersecurity was treated like a backroom IT maintenance task, right? But a new global study from Rimini Street suggests those days are officially over. It's a pleasure to be here, Noah. The report is actually quite striking. It surveyed senior executives across various global sectors and found that cybersecurity has, well, it's transcended the IT department. It's now a matter of institutional survival. In fact, 54% of respondents listed security threats as their most pressing external risk. That's ranking it higher than supply chain disruptions or even economic downturns. Right. That's a massive shift in priority. From my perspective, covering the future of employment, what's interesting is how this links directly to the talent crisis. The report highlights that leaders are struggling to find and keep specialized security staff. This isn't just an HR problem anymore. It's a vulnerability that's forcing many companies to change their entire labor model. Exactly. And, you know, that leads to a significant trend in the data, the rise of outsourcing. About 43% of organizations are already outsourcing their security workloads, and another 46% are considering it. In sectors like finance and telecom, where the regulatory stakes are incredibly high, they're using external partners just to keep the lights on and the systems monitored, while their internal teams try to focus on broader strategy. And I mean, the pressure on those internal teams is just immense. We're seeing a pattern where routine maintenance and keeping a gears turning is consuming so much bandwidth that defensive improvements get sidelined. It's a vicious cycle. Staffing gaps lead to more risk, which leads to more burnout and so on. Mm-hmm. There's also a fascinating diplomatic angle here regarding vendor relationships. Many executives expressed frustration with what they call vendor lock-in. About 35% say they feel pressured by forced upgrades and rigid roadmaps. They want the freedom to modernize on their own terms, particularly in critical infrastructure sectors like energy, where systems need to be long-lived and incredibly stable. Yeah, and Rimini Street's global CIO, Joe LeCondro, put it quite bluntly. He said executives want to break free from these upgrade cycles that consume budget without delivering proportional value. they want to redirect those resources toward AI and strategic initiatives that actually move the needle. Agreable. Summing up the core business shift. Totally. It's a move towards sovereignty in technology. Leaders are now applying the same financial standards to security investments that they would to any other major enterprise project. They want to see measurable business value, you know, reduced incident costs and improved resilience, rather than just checking a box for the IT department. In short, if you're a CISO today, you aren't just talking about firewalls. You're talking about ROI and long-term business continuity. Security is now the foundation of the digital workforce. A vital takeaway for any organization navigating the current geopolitical and technical landscape. Thanks for joining us for this insight. We'll see you next time on Prime Cyber Insights. Neural Newscast is AI-assisted, human-reviewed. View our AI transparency policy at neuralnewscast.com.