Redazione RHC : 11 November 2025 21:47
Risk analysis is an important process in the context of ICT Risk Management as it allows us to evaluate the effectiveness of the technical countermeasures adopted to mitigate ICT risks.
This process involves assessing the security of information systems and technological infrastructure, as well as the information security management processes adopted by the organization.
In this article, we’ll explore what risk analysis means and how this process helps organizations reduce cyber risk and increase resilience.
In IT risk management, asset identification is a key step in the risk assessment process. In this step, the company’s IT assets are identified and classified based on their importance to the business.
IT assets can include servers, computers, laptops, mobile devices, applications, software, data, and other computing resources . Identifying these assets is important because it allows you to better understand which IT resources are critical to your business and focus your security efforts on those resources.
Asset identification involves creating an inventory of all the company’s IT assets , including those owned by the company and those provided by third parties. This inventory must be updated regularly to reflect changes in the company’s IT environment.
Once assets have been identified and classified, the company can focus on protecting the most critical assets. These assets must be protected with appropriate security measures, such as access controls, encryption, firewalls, and advanced cybersecurity solutions.
Additionally, asset identification can help a company better understand the costs associated with protecting IT assets. For example, a company can determine the costs associated with purchasing software licenses, updating applications, and implementing new security solutions.
Threat analysis is an essential phase of cyber risk assessment. It involves identifying and assessing threats that could cause damage to a company’s IT assets.
Threat analysis involves assessing the likelihood of a threat occurring and the consequences it could cause. It’s important to consider all possible threats, including those from internal and external sources.
To identify threats, you can use various sources of information, such as security reports, vulnerability analyses, cyber attack news, and reports from organizations specializing in cybersecurity.
Once the threats have been identified, the level of risk associated with each must be assessed. This assessment can be done using a risk assessment matrix, which assigns a score to each threat based on its likelihood and potential impact.
Furthermore, it is important to consider the possible countermeasures to be adopted to mitigate the risk associated with each threat. Countermeasures may include implementing cybersecurity measures, adopting internal company policies and procedures, and cyber risk insurance.
Threat analysis should be repeated regularly to ensure that the company is always prepared to face new threats that may emerge over time.
Vulnerability assessment is an important phase of risk analysis. In this phase, vulnerabilities in the organization’s information systems and technological infrastructure are identified and assessed. Vulnerabilities can be of various types, such as misconfigurations, software bugs, network security issues, and so on.
Vulnerability assessment is important for identifying weaknesses in an organization’s information systems and understanding how these can be exploited by attackers.
Based on the results of the risk assessment, it will be possible to define the most appropriate technical countermeasures to mitigate the associated risks.
Planning and managing the risk analysis process is essential to ensure that the assessment is carried out systematically and consistently, and that the results are reliable and useful to the organization.
First, it’s important to clearly define the evaluation objectives and identify the products or solutions to be evaluated. Next, it’s necessary to define the evaluation criteria and security requirements relevant to the organization. These criteria should be clearly and objectively defined to allow for an accurate evaluation of the products or solutions.
Once the evaluation criteria have been defined, it is necessary to identify the security experts who will be involved in the evaluation. These experts should have a solid knowledge of cybersecurity and ICT solutions and should be able to evaluate products or solutions based on the defined criteria.
Next, it is necessary to define the time schedule for the evaluation process , considering the duration of the entire process, the deadlines for submitting offers and any negotiation needs with suppliers.
During the evaluation phase, it is important to ensure that the evaluation is conducted consistently and systematically, and that the results are clearly and comprehensively documented . This may require the use of specific tools and methodologies for evaluating products or solutions.
Finally, it is important to define how the assessment results will be communicated to the organization and relevant suppliers. In some cases, it may be necessary to negotiate with suppliers to ensure they meet the organization’s security requirements.
The evaluation criteria identification phase is crucial to the successful execution of the Technical Evaluation. In this phase, the evaluation criteria that will be used to analyze the risks associated with IT systems and business applications are defined.
Evaluation criteria should be based on data security, reliability, integrity, and availability requirements. These criteria may vary depending on the needs of the company and the systems being evaluated.
For example, when assessing the security of information systems, evaluation criteria might include the presence of effective access controls, the presence of firewalls, encryption of sensitive data, password management, and protection against malware and cyber attacks.
When evaluating system reliability, evaluation criteria may include data availability, the ability of systems to handle heavy workloads, and the ability of systems to recover data in the event of failures.
It’s important that the evaluation criteria are clear and well-defined so that the technical assessment can be performed accurately and comprehensively. Furthermore, the evaluation criteria must align with security standards and corporate policies regarding IT risk management.
Defining evaluation criteria requires the collaboration of cybersecurity and ICT Risk Management experts. Furthermore, the evaluation criteria identification phase requires a thorough understanding of corporate IT systems and applications, as well as a good knowledge of cybersecurity and risk management best practices.
The technical assessment phase is where the previously identified assessment criteria are applied to assess the risks associated with IT systems and business applications.
At this stage, cybersecurity experts perform a series of tests and analyses on IT systems to identify any vulnerabilities and potential associated risks . The technical assessment may include document analysis, but also penetration testing, system log analysis, security data analysis, regulatory and corporate policy compliance assessments, third-party risk analysis, and assessment of system resilience to cyberattacks.
During the technical assessment, data on identified vulnerabilities and risks is collected and a risk rating is established for each identified vulnerability or risk. This risk rating is used to identify the risk mitigation actions that need to be implemented.
It is important that the technical assessment is carefully documented so that the results can be used to identify the necessary risk mitigation actions.
The technical assessment is a fundamental step in the ICT Risk Management process because it identifies risks associated with IT systems and business applications. Furthermore, the technical assessment helps prioritize risk mitigation actions and ensure that security measures are effectively implemented to protect the company from cyber risks.
Security requirements are the characteristics a system or application must have to ensure the protection of the information and data it manages. They represent the specifications necessary to ensure that the system or application is able to prevent, detect, and respond to security threats.
In the technical assessment, security requirements are considered as one of the evaluation criteria to determine whether an ICT product or solution meets the organization’s security requirements. These requirements can be defined specifically for the organization or can be established by internationally recognized security standards.
During the risk analysis, security experts assess whether the organization’s security requirements are met by the product or solution under consideration. If the security requirements are not met, it may be necessary to seek another solution or make changes to the product or solution to ensure security requirements are met. Additionally, additional security requirements may be defined to ensure the product or solution can address emerging threats or changes in the organization’s security needs.
Remediation plans are linked to security requirements that have not been implemented. These plans outline the actions needed to implement specific security measures within a given ICT asset.
In other words, these remediation plans focus on the specific actions that must be taken to mitigate the risks associated with unimplemented or non-compliant security requirements.
This may include prioritizing the implementation of missing requirements, identifying alternative solutions to mitigate associated risks, assigning specific responsibilities for implementing missing requirements, and establishing a monitoring plan to ensure that security requirements are implemented and maintained.
The ultimate goal of these recovery plans is to ensure that the organization is able to effectively manage disruptions and emergency situations, limiting negative impacts on customers, staff, and the organization’s operations.
Once the risk analysis is completed, the findings and recommendations must be presented to the relevant stakeholders. These stakeholders may include the organization’s management, technical staff, and stakeholders.
The presentation should include an overview of the process results, the threats identified and recommendations for mitigating them, as well as any limitations or issues encountered during the assessment process.
Finally, it’s important to view risk analysis as a continuous and iterative process . The threat environment and technologies are constantly changing, and therefore the assessment process must be continually reviewed and updated to ensure the organization’s security is maintained at the desired level. This means that planning for the next risk analysis should begin shortly after the previous one is completed.
In conclusion, risk analysis is a fundamental process for assessing and managing security risks within ICT Risk Management. Its effectiveness depends on the correct identification of assets, the assessment techniques used, and the ability to translate assessment results into concrete actions to mitigate threats.
Furthermore, the process must be continuously reviewed and updated to ensure that the organization’s security is maintained at the desired level.
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