Virtual CISO

Virtual CISO Program

A vCISO engagement is designed to meet security programs where they’re at. We start by going through an onboarding assessment to get an understanding of the maturity of your program. With that, we can provide initial remediation recommendations to address glaring concerns and prepare you for a more extensive risk assessment. Ultimately, your vCISO engages in a constant cycle of assessing and remediating—allowing you to meet your security goals.

Get our vCISO services to help build out your security program in the most cost-effective, efficient and highest-impact.

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vCISO Program Steps

Full Risk Assessment

With the help vCISO, this assessment will determine administrative, physical, internal, and external technical risk so that targeted improvements can be made.

Roadmap

A roadmap will be created based on the findings from your full risk assessment, then we will begin by focusing on the highest impact security objectives to improve your security posture and business as a whole.

vCISO Engagement

Our vCISO will be your security expert to ensure your organization stays on target and will be there to assist with coaching, policies, asset management, or wherever else your in-house team requires additional support.

Virtual CISO FAQ

Virtual CISO cost is based on several variables such as the size and complexity of your organization, the number of devices in your network, and estimated time spent working with you as a client. You should expect to spend $4k-$6k or more per month based on these factors. This price includes annual assessments, roadmapping, vulnerability scanning, consulting services, and access to portal software for tracking and communication purposes. Our typical virtual CISO cost less over time as our clients’ security programs go into “maintenance mode,” where the consistent building effort is no longer a factor.

A virtual CISO is an assigned resource with experience building and improving information security programs. Starting with a risk assessment, a vCISO first gets an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of an organization’s security program. Based on the results, the vCISO then works with executive leadership teams to understand goals, budget, and bandwidth—allowing them to provide actionable recommendations, or a roadmap, based on the business’s goals and the risk assessment’s findings. With the roadmap in place, they work with the organization’s internal security team to train staff and make the recommended improvements, improving the ability of the organization to protect its sensitive information and increase its operational efficiencies. Over time, they simply become a sounding board for the organization’s staff to bounce questions and challenges off of.

CISO as a service is another name for virtual CISO consulting services. A provider like FRSecure assigns organizations a proven and certified information security professional to help organizations protect sensitive information and achieve related business goals along the way.

The truth is, CISOs are expensive. Most of them cost between $250k and $350k when you factor in salaries and benefits. That’s not always easy for small- and medium-sized businesses to cover.

vCISO services are meant to be flexible in order to meet the needs of each of our clients. Engagements typically follow a cycle of assess, plan, and remediate.

Whether you need high-level guidance on a monthly or quarterly basis or need hands-on help several days per week, our vCISO’s will be able to build a solution for you.

Typical objectives of vCISO engagements include:

  • Information security leadership and guidance
  • Steering committee leadership or participation
  • Security compliance management
  • Security policy, process, and procedure development
  • Incident response planning
  • Security training and awareness
  • Board and executive leadership presentations
  • Security assessment
  • Internal audit
  • Vulnerability assessments
  • Risk assessment

And much, much more.

Lower Cost Over Time

Virtual CISO cost can be expensive depending on your business’s size and needs. But, most of the work is preliminary, so the involvement (and therefore what a virtual CISO costs) decreases over time.

Extensive Industry Knowledge and Skill

Does your “security” person wear a ton of hats in the organization? It’s not uncommon for companies to assign security roles as a secondary function of an employee’s primary role. Because of this, they’re often not true experts. vCISOs, are highly skilled and certified experts with years of information security experience. A virtual CISO is going to be able to enhance the internal capabilities of your employees tasked with handling security through the techniques they’ve learned.

Limited Turnover

Let’s face it, the security job market is as competitive as ever. We have to worry about employees leaving anyway, but that only adds to it. With an vCISO, you equip your team with the expertise, methodologies, and resources to avoid losing a step—either as you work to hire a new CISO, or if you want our team to occupy that role.