In the film Jurassic Park, the collapse of the attraction was not caused by the obvious danger that the dinosaurs posed, but by a rogue employee called Dennis Nedry who used his insider knowledge of the computer systems to steal intellectual property, threaten safety and disrupt the running of the park. The same “Insider Threat” exists in virtually every organisation.

All the security measures in Jurassic Park were of sound logic and highly connected, from the electric fences, to the lighting in the visitor centre to the locks on the doors, and when they were working correctly helped the park to maintain an efficient operation and a positive customer experience.

However, complex systems, whether they be in fictional attractions or in real world organisations require centralised control with manual management and manual interventions, which is where the inherent risk resides – with people.

As was the case in Jurassic Park, most organisations do not consider or have proper risk management policies and procedures in place to monitor and mitigate against unusual human behaviour patterns.  Jurassic Park is a good analogy, as the park’s employees knew they were working with animals that had a huge potential to be dangerous so had put all the usual precautions in place such as electric fences, motion sensors and moats, but had no such precautions in place to detect early signs of the bigger risk than the dinosaurs, namely the Insider Threat.

A recent Forrester report states that 75% of data breaches were not due to outsiders, but employees – insiders. This is a very worrying statistic as while outsiders do cause problems, intelligent systems and solutions can be put in place to reduce the risk of unwanted attacks, how do you protect yourself from employees causing problems?

While organisations will never stop disasters from occurring, the risk can be reduced by understanding the risk that Insiders pose and putting in place intelligent systems and processes designed to detect unusual or malicious human behaviour as soon as it manifests.

Having a holistic approach to Insider Threats will allow you to intervene or take the appropriate action before someone within your organisation goes rogue and sets free your metaphorical dinosaurs.

To learn more about the Insider Threat and how advanced Insider Threat management software can help protect your organisation, contact us today.