Socio-technical gambits that destroy cyber security & organisational resilience

Abstract

This chapter summarises how an organisation (and key individuals within it) could be subject to smart targeting by cyber and other attacks - underpinned by re-conceptualising the ways in which decision-making by individuals and bureaucracies can be influenced or even directed. Beginning with a short summary of the author’s practical experience, the chapter then presents the notion of the choice architecture, followed by a dissection of some of the ways in which malign influence can be generated by or over decision-makers – underpinned by the author’s observation of such phenomena in the real world. The chapter concludes by arguing that organisations can and should accrue competitive advantage by recognising that their decision-making competences are vulnerable to the imaginative and determined adversary. The use of fast, frequent and cheap exercises to enhance scanning for threats placed (or placeable) within an organisation and to supplement the situational awareness, alertness and robust response of individuals and structures is recommended