Editors Note: This is the final post in our three-part series on cybersecurity from the perspective of a Chief Financial Officer.
Chief Financial Officers (CFO) need clear, consistent signals that cybersecurity investments are accurately assessing risks and protecting the business. The Chief Information Security Officer’s (CISO) role is to manage that risk. To align efforts and ensure security strategies are financially sound, CFOs and CISOs need specific KPIs and reports on a regular cadence to ensure transparency, accountability, and active risk management.
Monthly Reports: Operational Security Focus
The monthly report is a pulse check on the day-to-day operational health of security. It focuses on efficiency, agility, and a clear signal of active threats. CFOs don’t need a list of every blocked attack, but they do need to see that controls are working and teams are responsive. Key metrics include:
- Mean Time to Remediate (MTTR) for Critical Vulnerabilities: This is the most important metric. A downward trend in the average time it takes to fix critical and high-severity vulnerabilities in production applications indicates that engineering and security teams are working in lockstep and a vulnerability management process is effective.
- Security Incident Volume & Impact: Instead of just a raw number, CFOs need to see a breakdown of incidents by type (e.g., phishing, DDoS, API abuse) and a risk score that reflects their potential financial or operational impact. This shows where the most significant threats are coming from and demonstrates security controls are targeting the right areas.
- Patching and Virtual Patching Coverage: This metric indicates what percentage of mission-critical applications are protected by the latest security controls, whether through a traditional patch or a virtual patch from a runtime protection solution. This provides a clear, defensible number of active risk mitigation efforts.
Quarterly Reports: Strategic Risk & Business Health
Quarterly reports step back from the daily grind and assess overall strategic risk. These reports monitor larger security investments and their impact on key business functions.
- Security Program ROI (Return on Investment): This is where the CISO should be able to justify their budget and present a clear ROI calculation based on the following metrics:
- Cost Avoidance: The estimated financial value of incidents that security controls, like runtime protection and remediation, have prevented and fixed.
- Efficiency Gains: The number of developer-hours saved by not having to manually address vulnerabilities that were virtually patched.
- Reduction in Cyber Insurance Premiums: A tangible sign that security posture is improving and being recognized by external underwriters.
- Compliance and Audit Performance: Audits and penetration tests should show a trend toward fewer findings, faster resolution times, and no critical exceptions. This metric is a direct reflection of the ability to meet regulatory demands and protect an organization’s reputation.
- Security Awareness & Culture Metrics: These measures prove that security is a company-wide effort. It includes a dashboard of phishing simulation results, employee click-through rate trends, and metrics related to security training completion across all departments.
Annual Security Reports: The Big Picture
The annual security report is the opportunity to reflect on long-term security strategies and discuss future security improvement plans. It’s a holistic view of how cybersecurity programs are safeguarding the enterprise value of an organization, enabling the business to thrive.
- Risk Profile Trend: This is a comprehensive look at how our overall financial risk from cyber threats has changed during the past year. Using a quantifiable risk framework, trend lines should demonstrate that security programs have directly led to a reduction in annualized loss expectancy (ALE).
- Resilience and Recovery Readiness: This report provides the results of full-scale disaster recovery and business continuity drills. CFOs need to see clear data on recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO) and confirmation that teams can restore critical operations within an acceptable timeframe following a major security event.
By working together, CFOs and CISOs ensure that cybersecurity is not just a cost center but a strategic imperative in protecting the financial health, brand, and ability to operate a business with confidence. This metric-based framework allows CFOs to ask a simple, powerful question at every meeting: “What is the dollar value of the risk we have mitigated?” The answer is a key to long-term success.
To learn how runtime protection and remediation from Waratek can reduce risks and costs while improving security, request a demo today.
