• 32 per cent of firms in North Asia have seen a significant increase in serious security incidents across their entire IT stack in the past 12 months
• One in five North Asian firms have dealt with a security breach
• Only 24 per cent of regional organisations are 'advanced' in leveraging security automation

TAIPEI, TAIWAN / BEIJING, CHINA / HONG KONG SAR - Media OutReach - 27 April 2023 - Telstra, a leading global telecommunications and technology company, today published research in partnership with research and advisory consultancy Omdia, exploring how companies are leveraging security technology for resilience and innovation in North Asia.
Working with Omdia, Telstra surveyed 250 senior technology decision makers at the end of 2022, to understand the state of Security Operations (SecOps) in North Asia, assessing security automation maturity across a range of complex technology environments and threats[1].
The purpose of the survey was to discover how organisations secure and defend their business from threats through automation, by exploring security automation maturity across the technology stack and end-to-end threat management. The newly launched whitepaper aims to arm security executives with the insights they need to bolster their organisational cybersecurity resilience and support their ongoing digital transformation projects.
"There is a real opportunity for organisations to leverage automation to drive operational efficiency and address known security incidents, allowing operational teams to focus on higher risk threats. This has the potential to reduce staff burnout and better safeguard vital business assets," said Paul Abfalter, Head of North Asia at Telstra.
The survey found that 32 per cent of firms have seen an increase in cyber-attacks over the past 12 months across their entire IT stack, most notably endpoints, network and operational technology devices. 66 per cent of organisations that experienced significantly increased serious security incidents also observed a surge in serious breaches.
The research also revealed 40 per cent of firms lost revenue due to these attacks, whilst 38 per cent suffered reputational damage and 34 per cent sustained operational downtime. However, security leaders are confident that with better security automation, they could reduce nearly 50 per cent of all serious security incidents. The research found that only 24 per cent of regional organisations are advanced in leveraging security automation, confirming that the rate of security automation is relatively low in North Asia, with limited use across the region.
"Security is becoming a growing concern, and a potential constraint to digital ambitions in the region. Security automation is vital to address this challenge. Leveraging automation in SecOps can enrich threat telemetry, unify toolsets, and harness AI/ML advancements to better protect, detect and respond to advanced persistent threats. However, technology alone won't solve the problem. Third party expertise is critical to address people, process and tool impacts within each firm's industry context, regulatory requirements, and corporate objectives." Adam Etherington, Senior Principal Analyst for Digital Enterprise Services at OMDIA.
Although many organisations are investing in additional cybersecurity platforms to overcome rising incidents and breaches, this has resulted in sprawling toolsets that generate a higher volume of alerts and false positives. The survey found that a large volume of threat alerts, alarms, tickets, and possible incidents generated by various security tools are causing issues for security professionals.
The false positives overwhelming security teams are caused by a dramatic increase in the attack surface as more operational technology (OT) devices become integrated with IT systems, lagging patch and device management across legacy technologies and a wide variety of non-integrated toolsets.
"Security executives must continually assess their organisational cybersecurity resilience to support ongoing digital transformation, leverage the right cyber partner and unlock value from security tools. Reaching optimised automation can be a long journey. It is important to work with experienced and trusted specialists to discover the best adoption and operational model for your organisation," Paul Abfalter added.
For more details, please click on the link below to download the research report:
https://www.telstra.com/security-automation-whitepaper
Download Country factsheet (Taiwan): https://release.media-outreach.com/i/Download/355421
Download Country factsheet (China): https://release.media-outreach.com/i/Download/355434
Download Country factsheet (Hong Kong): https://release.media-outreach.com/i/Download/355441

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About Telstra

Telstra is a leading telecommunications and technology company with a proudly Australian heritage and a longstanding, growing international business.
Today, we operate in over 20 countries outside of Australia, providing services to thousands of business, government, carrier and OTT customers. Telstra Enterprise is a division of Telstra that provides data and IP networks and network application services, such as managed networks, unified communications, cloud, industry solutions and integrated services.
Telstra Purple, our professional and managed services business in Australia, Asia and the UK, brings together people and innovative solutions to define and deliver a clear vision of our customers' transformation journey, network foundation, and the protection they need to thrive.
These services are underpinned by our subsea cable network, one of the largest in the Asia Pacific region, with licenses in Asia, Europe and the Americas, and access to more than 2,000 Points-of-Presence around the world.
For more information, please visit

www.telstra.com.hk.