New era of trusted commerce for businesses

The decisions that business leaders are making now about cybersecurity will separate winners from laggards in key industries for a generation within 5 years. Organizations seeking to gain a competitive advantage based on industry-leading protections for systems and data must look at both long-term strategic decisions and tactical actions through this lens. Many companies already have a certain level of competence in the field of trust. They spend money on security, resilience and anti-fraud, and define career paths for technologists with an aptitude and appetite for these skills. But without a strategic approach, organizations miss vital opportunities to derive value from their security function.

We all know that leaders in digital businesses value innovation and time-to-market, and customers insist that control is invisible and cheap. And it is often said that cybersecurity is a cost of entry, a limitation of flexibility and a necessary evil. Perhaps as a result, with few exceptions (e.g. Apple), values ​​of trust are rarely used for business benefit. Even in sensitive industries such as banking and healthcare, sales propositions often focus on convenience, cost, and coolness.

Forward-thinking Chief Information Security Officers, Chief Risk Officers and Board Risk Committees can help organizations move away from looking at cybersecurity as a cost and recognize its potential as a competitive differentiator.

At Booz Allen, we know how to make the information security function a differentiator by organically increasing the reach of the stakeholders involved. Initially, the security mission focused on the five functions of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework: identify, protect, detect, respond, and remediate. As these capabilities are mastered through a process of continuous improvement, their scope and value can be increased to enhance cyber resilience against threats to operational functions and ultimately enable customer-centric, revenue-enhancing products and services that deliver value.

We’ve worked with clients to put this approach into action. A multinational manufacturer analyzed vulnerabilities in its operational technology (OT) assets and based on the findings improved supply chain visibility and prevented disruption as online commerce flooded delivery channels, allowing the company to gain a sticky market share. An ecommerce sales platform offered plugins to seamlessly add biometric authentication for online shoppers, reducing cart dropouts by more than two-thirds. A bank replaced its homegrown mobile app with a cloud-hosted multichannel experience and vastly increased number of accounts, while reducing complaint resolution, while also reducing data center costs and increasing availability to nearly 100% .

These are examples of how you can win in the new post-pandemic economy. Prospective customers, business partners and regulators seek solutions and leadership based entirely on trust.

First-mover opportunities abound, as well as potentially disastrous pitfalls for those who choose to compete. Organizations that invest smartly in cybersecurity and expand their mission to enable trusted commerce will gain positive competitive advantages.