Introduction

Cybersecurity teams interact with massive amounts of real-time, first-party data. This data gets automatically analyzed by security tools, and occasionally some of this gets escalated to a Cybersecurity Analyst for manual analysis. A vast majority of the time, the data rarely contains meaningful security value. Of course the moment your systems do identify data containing meaningful security value, it makes storing the massive amounts of unused data worth collecting.

But here's the thing:

Most of this unused data could actually help the business — if only people knew it existed, or how to use it.

The same organization's marketing and sales departments could be spending thousands to millions per year to buy this exact data from third parties. The problem with third-party data is it is often poor quality, fraudulent, invalid, risky, or duplicate.

While Cybersecurity sits on all of this data, marketing and sales departments could be leveraging it to further understand customer product usage, correlate customer behavior, and interact with your customers in new ways that leave them feeling like you care deeply about their experience (because you do).

Now let me be clear - nobody should give marketing and sales departments unfettered access to Cybersecurity systems. Obviously this sensitive in its own right, and must be extracted and handled securely prior to any business usage.

That being said, the goal of this thought experiment is to reframe Cybersecurity from a business risk manager into a business revenue enabler.

What Cybersecurity Sees That No One Else Does

Cybersecurity is often viewed as a blocker and a cost center, frequently experiencing tight budgets, budget cuts, and frustration among their business counterparts. But Cybersecurity isn't just about saying no — it's about enabling better yeses.

They enable better yeses by assessing the risk of third party companies, requiring best practices for technology, monitoring authentication events, Wi-Fi events, endpoint usage, and so much more.

Consider the data that Cybersecurity deals with —

• Authentication & SSO logs show how often users log in, from where, and at what times. This could tell you when people use your product, how people actually use your products, who is a champion for your product, and more.
• Wi-Fi logs show foot traffic in your offices or stores. They tell you how long people stay and how frequently they return.
• Endpoint usage reveals which tools are being used, who is using them, and when. This is a goldmine for product teams.
• Email logs reveal how often Sales corresponds with different customers, and reveal how often Marketing campaigns reach these different customers.

Imagine providing Revenue teams with information about how often customers are accessing your products. Maybe a customer uses your service at a certain time of day or a certain day of the week, and a well-timed notification could enhance their experience. Or imagine enriching the CRM with actual usage analytics, allowing your organization to identify both power customers and inactive customers.

And that's only just the beginning.

If you think leveraging Cybersecurity data is a risk, just remember - the ultimate business risk is going out of business. In a capitalist society, it is everyone's job to ensure the sustainability of the business first and foremost.

Why Now

First-party data continues to become more relevant every year. While some companies like Google continue to drag their feet on blocking third-party tracking, others like Apple and Mozilla have taken significant strides to mitigate unfettered third-party tracking. For instance, Apple now requires users to opt-in to cross-application tracking and location tracking. Firefox turns third-party cookie tracking off by default, and requires that users opt-in on their own accord.

The battle between privacy and convenience isn't going anywhere. But what's clear is this:

First-party data wins.

It's more accurate. It's already consented to. You already have it. And you minimize the potential for legal troubles, fines, and brand damage.

Cybersecurity has been sitting on the best source of first-party data for years. Now that the world is moving away from cookies, the value of this data is higher than ever. Marketing is scrambling to get this data. Sales is struggling to correlate this data. Leadership wants smarter insights.

How To Get Started

So how might a company discuss leveraging Cybersecurity data as first-party data?

First things first - you must educate leaders on the possibilities of leveraging first-party data. If leaders across departments are unaware of what other departments have to offer, then you must enlighten them. If the CEO is unaware of how first-party data can transform the business, then you may have problems beyond the scope of this thought experiment.

Once leaders are educated on the possibilities, then it's time to break down silos. Before any work begins, each department must understand how Cybersecurity data may be valuable to their department. At this point it's a matter of bringing the right minds to the table. Cybersecurity, Product, Revenue (i.e. Sales & Marketing), and Data stakeholders should all participate in understanding how they can leverage each other for first-party data. Product and Data teams can often apply the critical thinking skills to ideate on the art of the possible, while Cybersecurity and Revenue teams should be transparent in the type of data they have, why they have it, and how they may be able to augment each other.

Once there is a plan, it is the organization's responsibility to anonymize this data in the ways that are relevant to them. It's worth noting that departments across the organization already work with highly sensitive data. Just consider the device ID's that the marketing team uses to target for ad campaigns. Or consider the CRM that is enriched for the sales team to be as personalized as possible when messaging their prospect. Cybersecurity isn't the only department with sensitive data, but their data often seems to be conflated in importance simply because it's labeled as "Cybersecurity data".

It's time we rethink what Cybersecurity data means to the organization. It's not special. It's not more sensitive than anything else in the business. So leverage it to create a better customer journey.

Don't Existing Tools Do A Better Job Of Providing First-Party Data?

While there are plenty of tools that help generate first-party data, there are also plenty of reasons you may not want to use these tools.

The first reason aligns to moral and ethical dilemmas. Some tools like Foursquare or Placer.ai provide SDKs for companies to add to their applications. These SDKs then go on to track users as much as possible. Creepy? Without a doubt. Enhances the customer experience? Without a doubt.

Just look at Chick-fil-A's Mobile App permissions:

They use your data to understand how far you travel, how much you spend, how frequently you visit, and more. It's no secret that they select the perfect locations for their restaurants - the data speaks for itself! (More will be said on this topic in our next blog: Chick-fil-A's Secret Sauce: Turning Mobility Data into a Competitive Advantage). It's no wonder why every other restaurant in the industry is also scrambling to release their own mobile apps - this data is a goldmine for insights!

If you don't want to know exactly where your customers sleep at night, Cybersecurity data may offer a balance - you can learn more about usage patterns and behavior without tracking every single movement they make.

The second reason is that first-party data aggregation tools like Foursquare and Placer.ai simply are not cheap. This kind of first-party data is extremely verbose, it requires a lot of compute, and and it requires a lot of storage. So much so that it is cost-prohibitive to use holistically, and you must strategically pick your battles when trying to apply this data to the organization.

By leveraging the data you already have access to, you can begin early experimentation, learn as an organization, and make informed decisions once you have an idea of how you can apply this first-party security data to your organization.

The third reason could simply be that you are an organization that prefers (or is required) to build these solutions in-house. Compliance is much more straightforward when it's data that you own.

The Payoff

If you do this right:

• Security becomes a revenue & growth partner
• Marketing works with real data, not guesses
• Sales has smarter leads and better timing
• Product makes better bets

And the business? It gets an edge no one else can copy — because no other company has access to your first-party data.

Here's the truth: The best security for any business is to stay in business. Whether it's compliance, access controls, or revenue, the business needs it all to maintain an advantage.

Cybersecurity can do more than defend the business. It can help the business grow.

Intertwine's Data Lakehouse

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Reach out to see how we can help you make sense of your unleveraged data.