Page 174 - Cyber Defense eMagazine April 2023

Third-Party Cyber Security Risk Management:

Best Practices

By Sananda Dasgupta, Tech Industry and Cybersecurity Writer at Coloco

Businesses are becoming increasingly reliant on third-party services for their various operations. In
today's interconnected business landscape, it is practically impossible for any business to survive without
collaborating with third-party vendors, suppliers, partners, contractors, and service providers. When this
collaboration happens in a digital space, it adds up to the existing cyber security threats.

These third-party entities regularly interact with your IT infrastructure and may have access to your
confidential data and privileged information. It increases the attack surface for the hackers who can use
the vulnerabilities in that third-party system to steal your information or launch an online attack.

Third-party Cyber Security Risk Management- Why it is Important?

Third-party cyber security risk is becoming a pressing concern for businesses of all sizes and industries.
Data suggests organizations worldwide use an average of 110 software-as-a-service (SaaS)
applications, and the number is ever-increasing.

Now think that each of these SaaS vendors offers services to hundreds or even thousands of clients. In
software supply chain attacks, hackers inject malicious code into an application to infect all users.

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