What 2025 Taught Us About Security: Three Priorities for Your 2026 Strategy

Most civil society organizations we worked with in 2025 lacked formal incident response plans. When incidents occurred - and they did - the difference between organizations that had even basic plans and those that didn't was striking.

Organizations without plans spent critical hours figuring out who to call, what to protect first, and how to communicate. Organizations with plans moved quickly through established procedures, contained damage faster, and maintained clearer communication throughout.

Who do we contact first? (Internal team, external support, legal counsel if needed)

What systems do we protect immediately? (What contains the most sensitive data?)

How do we communicate internally and externally? (Who says what to whom?)

What information do we document? (For legal, advocacy, and learning purposes)

Your plan doesn't need to be comprehensive initially. A two-page document that everyone knows how to access is infinitely more valuable than a detailed plan that nobody's read.

The key is having something written down before you need it. When you're in the middle of an incident, your brain doesn't work as clearly. Having a document that says "Step 1: Contact these people. Step 2: Secure these systems. Step 3: Document these things" makes an enormous difference.

Throughout 2025, the organizations that maintained strong security posture were those that embedded security into their regular operations rather than treating it as annual training events.

Security training from 2023 is already outdated. Threats evolved constantly throughout 2025 - AI harassment tactics, new mobile vulnerabilities, emerging supply chain risks - and they'll continue evolving in 2026. One-time training can't address a constantly changing threat landscape.

Integrate it into onboarding. New staff should learn security procedures as part of learning their role, not as separate requirements. When it's part of "here's how we work," it gets internalized.

Conduct quarterly refreshers. Brief, focused sessions on current threats and evolving best practices. Twenty minutes every quarter beats a four-hour workshop once a year.

Keep it practical and relevant. Address threats your team actually faces and tools they actually use. Generic cyber hygiene lectures don't create behavior change.

Make it conversational, not lecture-style. Security culture develops through regular discussions, not formal presentations. Five-minute check-ins at team meetings often accomplish more than lengthy workshops.

Update based on actual incidents. When something happens in your sector or to similar organizations, discuss it immediately while it's relevant. Real examples are more impactful than hypothetical scenarios.

The goal isn't perfect knowledge retention. It's building organizational muscle memory where secure practices become automatic.

Generic security checklists don't reflect the reality civil society organizations face. Throughout 2025, we saw organizations implementing recommended security measures that didn't actually address their primary threats while leaving real vulnerabilities unaddressed.

Your risk assessment needs to map your actual threats based on your actual work context, not a one-size-fits-all template.

Who might want to disrupt or monitor our work? Be specific. "Hackers" is too vague. Is it government actors? Criminal groups? Competitors? Adversarial movements? Your defenses need to match your actual adversaries.

What information could put people in danger if exposed? Sources, beneficiaries, sensitive research, strategic plans, partner organizations. Identify what actually matters in your context.

What are our most critical systems and workflows? What would disrupt your work most if compromised? What do you absolutely need to keep operating?

Where are we most vulnerable right now? Be honest. No organization has perfect security. Understanding your weakest points helps you prioritize improvements.

What security measures would our team actually use consistently? The most sophisticated security tool provides no protection if your team works around it because it's too complicated or time-consuming.

Whether you use our tool at assessment.boltech.global or another framework, understanding your specific threat landscape is the foundation for effective security decisions. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good - even a basic threat assessment is better than none.