One of the most important responsibilities of the information security professional (or any IT professional, for that matter) is to help management make well-informed decisions. Unfortunately, this has been an elusive objective when it comes to risk. Although we’re great at identifying control deficiencies, and we can talk all day long about the various threats we face, we have historically had a poor track record when it comes to risk. There are a number of reasons for this, but in this article I’ll focus on just one -- definition.
You’ve probably heard the old adage, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure.” Well, I’d add to that by saying, “You can’t measure what you haven’t defined.” The unfortunate fact is that the information security profession has been inconsistent in how it defines and uses the term “risk.” Ask a number of professionals to define the term, and you will get a variety of definitions.
Besides inconsistency, another problem regarding the term “risk” is that many of the common definitions don’t fit the information security problem space or simply aren’t practical. For example, the ISO27000 standard defines risk as, “the effect of uncertainty on objectives.” What does that mean?
You’ve probably heard the old adage, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure.” Well, I’d add to that by saying, “You can’t measure what you haven’t defined.” The unfortunate fact is that the information security profession has been inconsistent in how it defines and uses the term “risk.” Ask a number of professionals to define the term, and you will get a variety of definitions.
Besides inconsistency, another problem regarding the term “risk” is that many of the common definitions don’t fit the information security problem space or simply aren’t practical. For example, the ISO27000 standard defines risk as, “the effect of uncertainty on objectives.” What does that mean?
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