Gartner Research

Stop Performing Cybersecurity Theater: It Is No Longer Scaling

Today’s digital systems are especially complex and nontransparent, making risk extremely challenging to estimate and manage.

Experts: Richard Addiscott, Paul Proctor, Tom Scholtz, Alex Michaels, Paul Furtado, Lisa Neubauer

Cybersecurity theater refers to actions that purport to reduce risk, without actually doing so, and it’s endemic. The size and complexity of the digital asset base is now so significant that cybersecurity leaders can’t keep up with the demand to pretend to protect everything, let alone do so.

Cybersecurity and risk management leaders should:

  • Reframe organizational expectations.
  • Revise the responsibility model.
  • Become a “theater critic” to identify ineffective cybersecurity activities.

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