Cyber security and network protection specialist ITC Secure Networking has reinforced its executive management team with the appointment of Gareth Lindahl-Wise as Chief Information Security Officer. Adding his skills in global corporate information security to ITC’s comprehensive technical capabilities, Lindahl-Wise will be instrumental in defining an expanded portfolio of security services and consultancy offerings to help organisations safeguard information and control risk.
According to the 2015 IDG/PwC Global State of Information Security Survey, security incidents are growing at 66% CAGR, while the budgets set aside to combat them have dipped 4%. However, as high profile data breaches and security exploits continue to capture news headlines, it isn’t only the biggest organisations that are in the firing line. The UK government’s recent Information Security Breaches Survey showed the average cost to small businesses of their worst security breach has almost doubled in the last year to between £65k and £115k.
“With the ever increasing threat landscape it’s important for mid-market companies facing increasing security investments to make the right choices and do what’s valuable and pragmatic for their business,” said Gareth Lindahl-Wise. “Taking up this new role I will supplement ITC’s existing world class managed security services with my enterprise based experience in Information Risk Management. My focus will be to integrate these capabilities in a way to deliver agile solutions primarily for the mid-market to help them fast track to a more mature security posture.”
Lindahl-Wise joins ITC from British American Tobacco, where he held various senior positions including Group Information Security Manager and Head of Global IT Security. He is also a former Director of the Information Security Forum, having sat as an elected member of its Executive Board for more than three years.
Commenting on the appointment Tom Millar, CEO of ITC said, “Gareth is a talented security professional, as well as a respected and recognised thought leader in the industry. He will be a great asset to the business as we accelerate our growth, ensuring our managed security services continue to operate at a world-class standard, and in executing an ambitious strategy for the evolution of ITC information security services alongside CTO Kevin Whelan.”
