Team CM
Partnering With the Cybermaniacs
What's In It For You? The title of this blog is a statement that I firmly believe should be at the center of any Channel Partner Program. I hear from...
Insight from our founder of Cybermaniacs - here’s what I’d say to a boardroom full of CISOs and execs reading the State of the Ransomware Report:
“This isn’t about the latest AI attack technique or patch cycle. It’s about the humans holding your frontline together — or falling apart at the seams. If your culture isn’t resilient, your strategy isn’t real. And if your people aren’t equipped psychologically and behaviorally to act under pressure, then your tech is just an expensive illusion of control.”
The State of Ransomware 2025 Report opens a powerful window into something we've been saying for years: the real breach isn’t just in code — it’s in culture.
1. Ransomware Isn’t Just a Tech Problem. It’s a People Problem.
The top operational root causes of ransomware attacks aren’t fancy zero-days or sophisticated adversaries. They are:
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Lack of expertise (40.2%)
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Unknown security gaps (40.1%)
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Lack of people/capacity (39.4%)
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Lack of protection and poor-quality defenses (39% and 37.1%)
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Human error (34.2%)
These are all indicators of organizational strain, broken communication loops, underinvestment in people, and gaps in psychological readiness. The systems aren't just fragile — the teams themselves are cracking under pressure.
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2. Cybersecurity Trauma is Real
The survey reveals that 100% of organizations with encrypted data reported human repercussions, including:
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41%: Anxiety/stress about future attacks
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34%: Feelings of guilt
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31%: Staff absence due to mental health
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25%: Leadership replacement
Let’s pause. These aren’t minor setbacks. This is evidence of chronic operational burnout, fear-driven leadership, and a lack of psychological safety. People are absorbing the blame because we’ve failed to design systems and cultures where security is distributed, understood, and lived.
Training modules won’t heal this.
3. Training is Not Enough. But Behavioral Empowerment Might Be.
Yes, phishing and malicious emails (37%) are still leading technical vectors. But awareness alone doesn’t stop a breach when people are:
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Exhausted
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Unclear on their roles
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Operating in blame-heavy or reactive environments
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Not practiced in real-time decision-making
We need to think of cyber behavior the way elite teams prepare for crises: repetitive scenario-based training, reflex-building, confidence reinforcement, and cultural alignment. Simulated stress environments, emotional intelligence coaching, decision heuristics for high-pressure moments — these are the real tools of behavioral readiness.
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4. Resilience is Behavioral, Not Just Technical
According to the data:
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Only 16% of orgs recovered in a day, even though 97% eventually did
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Recovery within a week improved from 35% → 53%
This tells a story of progress — but also a warning: Recovery is about preparation, response choreography, and team alignment, not just backups and tech stacks.
The organizations that recover faster likely:
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Have emotionally intelligent leadership
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Empower cross-functional teams with playbooks they’ve practiced
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Trust each other in the storm
Culture = Speed. Period. Our culture models and enablement factors system can help you measure this.
5. What Gets Measured, Gets Funded — But Human Risk Still Isn’t Measured
The report shows strong year-over-year trend tracking of:
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Recovery time
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Encryption/exfiltration ratios
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Payment-to-demand deltas
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Root cause distributions
But nowhere do we see metrics like:
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Behavioral responsiveness
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Human risk scores
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Cultural resilience indicators
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Security culture maturity models
Executive dashboards are failing to reflect the human layer of cyber risk. As a result, budgets flow to endpoint protection but not mindset protection. This is a dangerous asymmetry.
Final Take: Cyber Resilience = Culture + Behavior + Adaptive Systems
As founder of Cybermaniacs, here’s what I’d say to a boardroom full of CISOs and execs reading this report:
“This isn’t about the latest AI attack technique or patch cycle. It’s about the humans holding your frontline together — or falling apart at the seams. If your culture isn’t resilient, your strategy isn’t real. And if your people aren’t equipped psychologically and behaviorally to act under pressure, then your tech is just an expensive illusion of control.”
What Organizations Should Do:
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Shift from Awareness to Empowerment: Create behavioral programs, not just training decks.
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Integrate Culture into Your Risk Register: Track resilience, responsiveness, and recognition metrics.
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Treat Human Risk Like a First-Class Citizen: With budgets, data, and board-level oversight.
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Embed Psychological Safety in IR Protocols: Post-breach trauma must be normalized and supported.
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Reframe Cybersecurity as a Collective Effort: Move away from shame and toward shared accountability.
More from the Trenches!
Cybermaniacs at RSAC2023: What Cyber Can Learn From First Responders
You can find the link to Kate moderating this session and reserve a seat! Location details here.
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Cyber Risk Management: It’s Not Just About Technology
For years, the default assumption in cybersecurity has been that managing risk is all about technology: firewalls, encryption, and the latest threat...
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