A Structured Approach to Guide the Development of Incident Management Capability for Security and Privacy

Abstract

The growth and evolution of threats, vulnerabilities, and cyber-attacks increase security incidents and generate adverse impacts on organizations. Nowadays, organizations have been strengthened in aspects of information security and information through the implementation of various technological solutions. Nevertheless, defined processes for the proper handling and coordinated management of security incidents should be established. In this paper, we propose an incident management framework that is adaptable to educational organizations and allows them to improve their management processes in the face of computer incidents. We introduce a coordination network with three levels of decision-making that defines interfaces and communication channels with supporting policies and procedures for coordination across processes and process actors. It enables different organizations to maintain focus on different objectives, to work jointly on common objectives, and to share information that supports them all in case of security incidents. Our model enables the examination of incident management processes that cross organizational boundaries, both internally and externally. This can help CSIRTs improve their ability to collaborate with other business units and other organizations when responding to incidents.