At a recent cyber security convention, I attended one of the keynote speakers lamented about how a trend seen recently in businesses is that they view cyber security as an insurance policy rather than a necessity. They do not believe that the costs of proper cybersecurity protection can be too high, and it is not needed if they have not been attacked. As more businesses suffer attacks and breaches this outlook will hopefully be left in the past but it is important to address the costs of building a cybersecurity program. The costs can be broken up into two major categories, financial and operational. Financially, the costs can be high, especially up front. Good cybersecurity software for a single computer is not super expensive, but when scaled to cover even a smaller organization the costs can add up. It is also imperative that the companies hire someone trained in IT and cybersecurity to run these programs. For a larger company that may not be a major burden, but for a small company with only 50-100 employes that can be difficult. IT is a fast-growing field and good cybersecurity managers do not come cheaply. Operational costs can also be expensive up front. When I was in the navy major system upgrades usually required shutting systems down for anywhere between a few hours or a week to perform the hardware swaps or software installations. This requires a lot of planning to make sure any non-IT work can be completed and in some cases it could not. This is something that organizations must battle with when analyzing the costs. But establishing a proper cybersecurity program has massive benefits that outweigh the costs. The biggest benefit is your information is secure. The chances of losing information to a data breach are significantly lower with a proper cybersecurity program in place. This also will make any customers or partners of a business feel much safer when doing business which can boost revenue and help offset costs.