The Hero of the Story:
The General Counsel
Life Sciences Company
A lot of Intellectual Property to Protect
Executive Team of More than a Dozen High-Profile Individuals
General Counsel Already Leading an Effort to Put Better Protections in Place then the CxO was Hacked
The Problem
While implementing a Digital Executive Protection Program, an Executive Assistant’s device was hacked.
Highly personal information of executives was exfiltrated
(e.g. passport numbers, SSN, passwords, etc.)
Company recently had a ransomware incident causing worry about risks from executives’ personal lives to both them and the company
- Loss of intellectual property
- Data breach risks
- Reputational risks
Executives were targeted in the breach
Executives and their assistants were compromised
Company information compromised
Companies are only as secure as their executives.
BlackCloak’s
Guidance
We recommended a holistic approach to ensure that company executives could protect their privacy, devices, homes, and peace of mind. Our plan consisted of four core elements:
Assess extent of compromise and exfiltration
Put identity theft protection and insurance in place for all exposed executives
Secure the executive team’s and their assistant’s personal devices and home networks
Set minds at ease by personalizing the response to their specific needs and give them control by not using corporate controls and personnel
Putting the Plan into Action
Because the General Counsel already took initiative on a digital executive protection project, they quickly accelerated post-breach remediation.
The company purchased BlackCloak plans for the entire executive team and assistants, including device monitoring and protection, home network scans, deep/dark web scans for exposed passwords, and other privacy features.
With help from BlackCloak, all executives enabled dual-factor authentication on email, bank, and social media accounts to prevent future breaches.
In addition to putting credit monitoring in place, identity theft insurance up to $1 million was included in each plan.
The Results
Protected company reputation and bottom line while preventing future hacking attempts
By partnering with BlackCloak early, the General Counsel accelerated the post-breach remediation. The General Counsel and CISO had BlackCloak secure the executive team’s personal devices (mobile and desktop) including installing anti-malware software on devices shared with family members. The company’s CISO and General Counsel are now receiving aggregated, anonymized reports on protection status. Thanks to these additions, when an executive’s personal social account was hacked six months later, the situation was detected and mitigated immediately.
