The Breach That Starts with Someone You Trust

Cyber incidents don’t always begin with a hacker targeting your systems directly. More often, they start with a trusted third party, a vendor, a SaaS tool, or a contractor who has access to your data, your systems, or your customers’ information.

That’s the conversation Xigent’s CISO, Amos Aesoph, and the team at North Risk Partners sat down to have, and the result is something that every business leader should read, not just your IT department.

Trusted Vendors Could be your Biggest Blind Spot

We’re talking about the smaller SaaS tool that three people on your finance team adopted last year. The regional IT firm that still has remote access to your systems. The contractor who needed temporary credentials that were never revoked

None of those feel like “cyber risks.” Until they are.

What we’ve seen is that risk doesn’t follow your budget. It follows your data. And the organizations that get ahead of third-party risk are the ones who stopped asking “how much do we pay this vendor?” and started asking “what can this vendor access? What happens if they’re compromised?

Here’s the Truth

After working through this with North Risk Partners, there are five ideas we keep coming back to:

1. If you don’t have a clear picture of every vendor, contractor, and SaaS tool that touches your systems or data, you’ve got some work to do.
2. Follow the data. Focus on sensitive data like customer records, employee information, and proprietary processes. Know where it goes and who handles it.
3. Don’t overlook any vendor. A vendor processing a critical workflow or handling regulated data is high-risk regardless of their size, reputation, or what you’re paying them.
4. Limit access. Build in the assumption that a vendor breach is a matter of when, not if, and make sure it stays contained.
5. Your incident response plan must cover vendors. If your leadership team does not have an actionable plan in case a key vendor is breached, that needs to change.

What’s Making this Harder Right Now

Employees are picking up AI tools at a rapid pace. Most of those tools haven’t been vetted, and some are quietly touching data they shouldn’t be near.

At the same time, phishing and social engineering attacks have gotten harder to spot with AI-generated emails, voice cloning, and deepfake videos.

Vendors rely on the same underlying platforms. A failure in one shared infrastructure provider can quietly take out multiple vendors at once. You might not even realize you have that concentration risk until a breach happens.

Here’s What to Do

Here’s the approach we’d suggest:

1. Start tracking your vendors. Which ones are critical? Which ones carry the most risk? Create the list in a centralized place.
2. Review your highest-risk contracts and access controls. Are vendors limited to what they actually need? Were they granted broad access because it was easier?
3. Run a tabletop exercise with your executive team. Specifically, around a vendor breach or outage. Not a technical drill. An honest conversation with leadership about what actions to take.



One More Thing, if You’re also Thinking About Insurance

Cyber underwriters are paying close attention to how organizations manage vendor risk. What they want to see are actual controls, such as multi-factor authentication, managed detection and response, and documented vendor risk management processes.

SOC 2 reports matter, but they’re a starting point, not a finish line. The organizations that get the best coverage terms are those that can show their work.

If any of this is prompting questions about where your organization stands, feel free to reach out to the Xigent team or connect with North Risk Partners Risk Advisors.

We’ve also put together a one-page summary you can share with your leadership team. Download the summary here.

Identify your vendor risks before they become breaches. Contact Us to assess your exposure and strengthen your security strategy today.

Xigent | In collaboration with North Risk Partners