Cyber risk is no longer a niche concern limited to IT teams or security specialists. Data breaches, ransomware attacks, regulatory penalties, and operational shutdowns have made it clear that cyber incidents can threaten revenue, reputation, and even business survival. Yet despite its growing impact, one question continues to surface inside organisations of all sizes: who should actually own cyber risk? In many companies, cyber risk falls into a grey area. IT teams manage systems, legal teams handle compliance, finance worries about losses, and leadership assumes someone else is in charge. This lack of clear ownership creates blind spots that attackers are quick to exploit. To manage cyber risk effectively, organisations must first decide where accountability truly sits.
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Cyber risk sits at the intersection of technology, operations, finance, legal, and human behaviour. Unlike traditional risks, it does not belong neatly to a single function.
Several factors contribute to confusion around ownership:
Cybersecurity originated as a technical discipline
Risk manifests across departments, not just IT
Leadership may lack technical confidence
Accountability is often fragmented across teams
As a result, many organisations treat cyber risk as a shared responsibility, which in practice often means no one fully owns it.
Why ‘IT Owns Cyber Risk’ Is an Incomplete Answer?
In many companies, cyber risk is automatically assigned to IT or information security teams. While these teams play a critical role, expecting them to fully own cyber risk is unrealistic and risky.
IT teams typically:
Manage infrastructure and systems
Implement security tools and controls
Respond to technical incidents
What they often do not control are business decisions that create cyber exposure, such as:
Vendor selection and access
Data collection and retention practices
Budget priorities
Risk appetite and trade-offs
When cyber risk ownership stops at IT, strategic decisions continue to be made without proper risk consideration.
Cyber Risk Is a Business Risk, Not Just a Technical One
Cyber incidents affect core business outcomes. They disrupt operations, erode customer trust, trigger regulatory scrutiny, and impact financial performance.
This makes cyber risk comparable to other enterprise risks such as financial, legal, and operational risk. These risks are not owned by individual teams alone. They are governed at the leadership level.
Treating cyber risk purely as a technical issue limits its visibility and prevents it from being integrated into broader business decision-making.
The Role of Senior Leadership
Ultimate accountability for cyber risk must rest with senior leadership. This includes the CEO and executive team.
Leadership is responsible for:
Setting the organisation’s risk appetite
Allocating resources and budgets
Prioritising security alongside growth
Ensuring accountability across functions
Without leadership ownership, cyber risk initiatives often lack authority and long-term commitment. Security becomes reactive, underfunded, and deprioritised during periods of growth or pressure.
When leadership actively owns cyber risk, it signals that security is a strategic priority, not an operational inconvenience.
Board-Level Oversight and Governance
In mature organisations, cyber risk oversight increasingly sits at the board level. Regulators, investors, and insurers expect boards to understand and monitor cyber exposure.
Board responsibilities typically include:
Ensuring cyber risk is part of enterprise risk management
Reviewing incident reports and response readiness
Challenging management on preparedness
Aligning cyber strategy with business objectives
Boards do not need technical expertise, but they must ask the right questions and demand clear accountability.
The Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) Perspective
Where present, the CISO often acts as the operational owner of cybersecurity. The CISO translates technical risk into business language and coordinates security efforts across the organisation.
However, the effectiveness of this role depends heavily on the reporting structure and authority.
A CISO who:
Reports directly to senior leadership
Has budget influence
Is involved in strategic decisions
can meaningfully manage cyber risk. Without this support, the role becomes reactive and limited.
However, shared responsibility does not mean shared ownership.
Clear ownership requires:
One accountable leader
Defined roles across departments
Escalation paths for unresolved risks
Regular reporting and review
Without a single owner, risks are often acknowledged but not addressed.
Cyber Risk and Enterprise Risk Management
Forward-looking organisations integrate cyber risk into enterprise risk management frameworks. This ensures cyber exposure is evaluated alongside other strategic risks.
Integration enables:
Consistent risk assessment
Leadership visibility
Better prioritisation
Informed decision-making
Cyber risk becomes part of routine business governance, rather than an isolated concern.
The Cost of Poor Ownership
When cyber risk ownership is unclear, warning signs often appear long before an incident occurs.
Common symptoms include:
Delayed responses to known vulnerabilities
Unclear incident response authority
Conflicting priorities between teams
Inconsistent security practices
When an incident eventually happens, the lack of ownership slows decision-making and amplifies damage.
The Role of Cyber Insurance in Ownership Conversations
Cyber insurance has added another dimension to cyber risk ownership. Insurers increasingly require evidence of governance, controls, and accountability before providing coverage.
Policy requirements often force organisations to:
Identify who owns cyber risk
Document security practices
Clarify incident response responsibilities
Insurance does not replace ownership, but it reinforces the need for it.
What Effective Cyber Risk Ownership Looks Like?
Strong organisations treat cyber risk as a leadership responsibility supported by specialists.
Effective models typically involve:
Board-level oversight
Executive ownership of cyber risk
A dedicated security leader managing execution
Clear cross-functional responsibilities
This structure balances strategic accountability with operational expertise.
Conclusion
Cyber risk ownership is not about assigning blame. It is about ensuring accountability.
While IT and security teams play a vital role, cyber risk ultimately affects the entire business. It influences revenue, reputation, compliance, and long-term resilience.
For this reason, cyber risk must be owned at the leadership level, governed by the board, and operationalised through clear roles and responsibilities across the organisation.
In a digital economy where trust and continuity define success, the question is no longer whether cyber risk needs an owner. It is whether organisations are willing to take ownership seriously before an incident forces the issue.
Disclaimer: Above mentioned insurers are arranged in alphabetical order. Policybazaar.com does not endorse, rate, or recommend any particular insurer or insurance product offered by an insurer.
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