How CISOs Can Build a Cyberstrong Organization
The CISO role has never been more challenging. The cyber threat landscape is expanding rapidly, with an ever-growing attack surface, AI-assisted threats, and increasing regulatory pressures. According to IBM’s Cost of a Data Breach Report 2024, the global average data breach cost has reached $4.9 million—a 10% increase over last year and the highest total ever recorded.
Yet, CISOs remain trapped in a reactive loop—defending against sophisticated and fast-adapting adversaries while also minimizing the overall risk exposure across the business with a limited budget. In this asymmetric game, attackers only need to find one critical flaw to execute a catastrophic breach. Defenders, with their limited resources, need to choose which subset of threat vectors to protect against and to what extent.
Compounding this challenge, many security leaders lack the visibility and metrics needed to quantify the impact of their security measures. This makes getting executive buy-in, justifying investments, and trading off risk and cost increasingly difficult. At the same time, organizations that don’t appropriately invest in the right security measures will inevitably suffer financial losses, regulatory penalties, and / or reputational damage.
We believe the solution to staying ahead of the rapidly evolving threat landscape lies in a concept we’re calling cyberstrength–a proactive and adaptive approach to security that supports innovation while minimizing risk. More on the basic tenets of cyberstrength below.
Stay Ahead with a Robust Offensive Security Strategy
AI is transforming cybersecurity for both attackers and defenders. To stay ahead, organizations must move beyond traditional security testing and embrace a strategy that combines AI efficiency with the ingenuity of the best security talent in the world.
By embracing an offensive security strategy that includes crowdsourced security programs and embeds continuous learning across multiple layers of security testing, organizations can mature their security approach into a strategic advantage.
Take Adobe, for example. Through a decade-long partnership with HackerOne, Adobe has leveraged security researchers to proactively identify and mitigate vulnerabilities. Since 2015, its bug bounty program has resolved over 7,403 security reports with contributions from 1,473 security researchers. This proactive approach has helped Adobe uphold the highest security standards across its vast product ecosystem, reinforcing trust with customers and partners alike.
Strengthen Every Stage—from Development to Deployment
The increasing cost of data breaches highlights the importance of prevention over reactive patching. Organizations that prioritize cybersecurity don’t wait for vulnerabilities to lead to crises—they proactively address them at every stage of the technology lifecycle.
HackerOne’s security approach integrates human expertise with AI tools to provide continuous vulnerability detection, validation, prioritization, and remediation throughout the development and deployment process. This includes AI-driven code scanning and expert reviews (HackerOne Code), pentesting as a service (HackerOne Pentest), and ongoing adversarial testing through bug bounty and vulnerability disclosure programs (HackerOne Bounty and HackerOne Response). Each of these elements builds upon the others to create a comprehensive, evolving defense.
By adopting HackerOne’s layered security strategy, CISOs can develop a proactive and adaptive approach to security that enhances innovation while maintaining speed and scale.
Secure the Next Frontier: AI Security, Safety, and Trust
As AI reshapes industries, it introduces new risks that traditional security models weren’t designed to handle. A robust offensive security approach for AI systems ensures they are not only effective but also trustworthy, safe, and resilient against emerging threats.
A prime example is Snap, which has partnered with HackerOne for over a decade to stay ahead of evolving threats. Snap is an early adopter of AI Red Teaming, working with HackerOne to test and refine strict safeguards for its generative AI systems. Together, we’ve developed innovative methodologies to uncover previously unknown vulnerabilities in AI systems, contributing to a safer, more trustworthy customer experience.
Snap also recently celebrated $1 million in bounties paid—a testament to its commitment to proactive security and staying ahead of the AI-driven threat landscape.
AI security, safety, and trust are immediate concerns, not future ones. Organizations that neglect to secure their AI systems risk cyber threats, regulatory scrutiny, and reputational damage. Furthermore, AI vulnerabilities aren’t limited to foundation model providers—any organization using these models in larger systems must test the entire architecture for security, safety, and trust issues.
Make Data-Driven Decisions using Return on Mitigation
Security leaders must go beyond defending their budgets and focus on proving the effectiveness of their security programs. Demonstrating the return on investment in security is crucial, as it helps align security efforts with broader business goals. One way to do this is by using Return on mitigation (RoM), a straightforward method for quantifying the value of preventing security incidents.
RoM allows Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) to assess the potential cost savings from avoiding security breaches, which helps in making data-driven decisions on where to allocate resources. By evaluating the effectiveness of security measures in terms of risk reduction and cost avoidance, RoM provides a clear framework for comparing and prioritizing investments.
This approach not only helps security leaders assess which security initiatives deliver the greatest impact but also allows them to demonstrate how security contributes to business continuity, protects valuable assets, and ensures long-term organizational success. Ultimately, it shifts the conversation from simply managing security to actively proving how it enhances overall business resilience and growth.
Turning Cybersecurity Into a Strategic Advantage
In conclusion, staying ahead of the evolving threat landscape requires a proactive and adaptive security approach—one that integrates cutting-edge technologies, human expertise, and continuous learning at every stage of the security lifecycle.
Cyberstrength, the concept we've explored, emphasizes the importance of blending offensive security strategies with AI-driven tools, fostering a culture of continuous improvement, and addressing the emerging risks that come with the rise of AI technologies. By adopting a layered security approach and making data-driven decisions, organizations can reduce risk, safeguard their assets, and maintain customer trust in an increasingly complex digital world.
As we look to the future, security leaders must not only defend their budgets but also prove the tangible value of their security programs—transforming cybersecurity from a necessary expense to a strategic business advantage.
