Protect your business. Cybersecurity is a business risk.

Why is cybersecurity a leadership issue?

Cyberattack is no longer just a concern for the IT department. It is a leadership issue that affects business continuity, cash flow, reputation, and customer trust. Estonia’s Information System Authority has made this explicit in its guidance for top executives: information security needs a systematic approach, clear ownership, adequate resources, and a culture that values cybersecurity. 

Global cybercrime has grown so large that, if measured like an economy, it would be comparable in scale to the world’s third-largest. Cybersecurity Ventures estimates annual cybercrime costs at $10.5 trillion in 2025. For comparison, the IMF’s October 2025 outlook lists Germany, the current third-largest economy by nominal GDP, at about $5.01 trillion, far below that figure. 

A cyberattack is not an IT problem. It is a business risk.

Across the Baltics, the pattern is clear. Estonia recorded 10,185 impactful cyber incidents in 2025, followed by 768 in January and 804 in February 2026. Latvia reported a record 923 manually processed cyber incidents in Q4 2025, including 676 fraud cases, and CERT.LV says social engineering, AI tools, and automation are intensifying the threat. Lithuania recorded 2,302 cyber incidents in the first nine months of 2025, while fraud cases rose from 288 to 551. These are not just technical issues. They are business risks with direct consequences for money, operations, and trust. 

Where does cyber risk really start in a company?

This is where cybersecurity becomes a leadership issue. The real question is not whether a firewall or antivirus solution exists. The real question is whether the company has clear responsibility, accountability, and a process that connects cybersecurity with business risks, priorities, and investment decisions.

• For many companies, the most practical first step is to make sure someone owns the information security agenda. That can be an internal role or an external one. Primend’s CISO-as-a-Service is designed to fill the role of a missing Chief Information Security Officer or support the person already responsible for security. 
   
• The second leadership question is visibility. If management does not know what is happening across networks, devices, cloud services, and logs, risk cannot be managed properly. This is why monitoring, logging, and a clear understanding of critical business risks matter. Latvia’s CERT.LV also stresses the need for proactive detection, response capability, and resilience as attacks become more adaptive and more automated. 
   
• The third issue is people and the tools they use every day. Email security, regular testing, and cyber hygiene matter because many incidents start with human error, weak passwords, delayed patching, or a manipulation attempt that arrives in a familiar format. In Estonia alone, more than 48,000 security vulnerabilities were registered in 2025, around one-fifth more than the year before. 

That is why risk reduction should combine technical controls with user awareness. No single tool solves the problem if the organisation lacks consistent leadership and a real security culture. The same applies to recovery: when something goes wrong, what matters is how quickly the business can continue. That requires clear roles, logs, backups, and a realistic action plan.

Where is the best place to start?

Cyber risk does not wait for a convenient moment. If leadership is not addressing it today, cybercriminals may be forcing the issue tomorrow. The good news is that companies do not need to build everything in-house or solve everything at once. The important thing is to take the first step, get a realistic view of the current situation, and decide which actions will reduce risk the most.
Is cybersecurity in your company managed with the same discipline as financial risk, legal risk, or supply chain risk? If not, this is the right place to start.

Why Primend?

Primend helps companies simplify and strengthen IT with a whole-company view, from infrastructure and cloud to Microsoft 365, backup, and cybersecurity. Primend’s service portfolio includes information security leadership support, Microsoft 365 security optimisation, cloud and backup solutions, and broader IT infrastructure services. 
We focus on the risks that matter most today and help define the most sensible next steps, whether that means clarifying ownership, improving visibility, strengthening Microsoft 365 security, improving backup readiness, or raising user awareness.
Get in touch with us and let’s review your company’s cybersecurity posture together and identify the most sensible place to start.

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