New research has found that many organisations will rely more on digital trust, but the required strategies, skill sets, and budgets are not keeping pace.
ISACA research released earlier this week revealed that 82% of respondents say digital trust will become more important within the next five years, yet only 20% are increasing budgets for digital trust.
Only 27% of the over 5,800 people surveyed say increased revenue is a current benefit of digital trust, which may indicate organisations are missing opportunities to improve revenues by prioritising digital trust. Other identified benefits include positive reputation, more reliable data for decision making, and fewer privacy breaches.
“Organisations must recognise that digital trust is foundational, expected and increasingly non-negotiable when it comes to securing customer loyalty, safeguarding data and ensuring regulatory compliance,” said ISACA’s Jo Stewart-Rattray.
“The accelerating pace of data breaches and increasing privacy concerns means businesses investing in robust digital trust practices are better positioned to mitigate risks and enhance their reputational capital. However, this requires a concerted effort from all levels of anorganisation, starting with leadership buy-in and extending to comprehensive staff training and the adoption of effective frameworks.”
ISACA is a global professional association and learning organisation that leverages the expertise of its more than 180,000 members who work in digital trust fields such as information security, governance, assurance, risk, privacy and quality. It has a presence in 188 countries.
94% of survey respondents who measure digital trust considered it extremely/very important to their organisation, and 93% feel it is very important to measure the maturity of their organisation’s digital trust practices. However, only 23% say their organisation measures digital trust maturity.
81% of respondents agree that organisations that demonstrate their commitment to digital trust (for example, with a high score rating from an independent third-party assessment) would ultimately be more successful.
Looking at confidence levels, only 52% of respondents are confident in the digital trustworthiness of their organisation. Respondents from Oceania had significantly less confidence in the digital trustworthiness of their organisations (38%) compared to those representing other regions. Additionally, respondents from the technology services/consulting and financial/banking industries expressed significantly more confidence in their organisations (59% and 58%, respectively) than those associated with the government/military sector (46%).
To achieve high confidence and strong maturity in digital trustworthiness, organisations often have to overcome obstacles that may limit or prevent them from pursuing digital trust. Top obstacles include a lack of staff skills (53%), lack of leadership buy-in (44%), lack of budget (44%), lack of alignment with digital trust and enterprise goals (43%), digital trust not being a priority (39%), lack of technological resources (37%), and insufficient processes and/or governance practices (37%).
“When executive leaders actively advocate for digital trust, it gains stronger buy-in, which then cascades into priority, alignment, budgets, training, and technical resources, overcoming many of the key challenges that can hold them back in realising strong levels of digital trustworthiness,” said ISACA’s Karen Heslop.
