“Innovation is great, but it brings complexity,” OZ Chief Solutions Officer Emmanuel Ramos told an audience at South Florida Innovation Day. “And complexity can be the enemy of security.”
It was one of many key insights to be gleaned from Ramos’ appearance on an Age of Digitization and Innovation panel which posed the overarching question, “Can Cybersecurity Catch Up?” to attendees of the bustling, edifying event held by the Alan B. Levan NSU Broward Center of Innovation.
The answer from Ramos—as well as TD Bank AVP of Engineering, Christiaan Veerman, and City Furniture CIO, Chad Simpson—was, practically speaking, absolutely.
But cybersecurity success will require intention, ecosystem-wide buy-in, and a mindset lithe and agile enough to shift as the threats do.
“At OZ, we believe that cybersecurity empowers digital transformation,” Ramos said. “The challenge is that digital transformation is going at such a speed that is difficult for the security teams to keep up. So, we work with our clients to ensure that their Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) does not end up operating out of the Office of No, so to speak. Even with all the changes taking place, the CISO needs to be seen as an enabler of business and success. Otherwise, support for their efforts will not materialize.”
Ramos pointed out that the near-instantaneous pivot into ubiquitous remote work during the pandemic raised serious questions about how to secure the digital and mobile devices of employees on various networks with varying degrees of security compliance.
While cybersecurity requires buy-in across the organization, Ramos argued it is essential that leadership set the bar by driving a knowledge culture within the organization.
“We’re ultimately all accountable as far as cybersecurity is concerned,” he said. “But from a training and knowledge culture perspective, it comes from the top. OZ is all about knowledge. That’s why we’re so focused on certifications and training and global apprentice programs. So that is embedded in our culture. And we want to help others make that the standard, not the exception.”
