One study indicates they experienced more disruption than their US/Europe counterparts, but also more interested in adopting zero-trust frameworks.

Based on a quantitative survey of 508 global CEOs and CISOs in Jan 2021, a survey on C-suite business and security strategies has indicated that the Asia Pacific region (APAC) suffered more pandemic disruption than Europe and the USA.

While different organizational departments were impacted in different ways throughout the pandemic, respondents from APAC departments reported higher levels of disruption in seven out of the 12 departments measured: Supply chain operations and factory; Cybersecurity/IT; Finance; Sales and marketing; Procurement; Risk management and compliance; HR; Aftermarket; Customer Service, Strategy/Business development; General management; and R&D.

The disruptive causes most commonly cited by APAC respondents were:

• Workforce reduction due to business disruption (38%)
• Reduced efficiency due to switching to a remote workforce (36%)
• Government-mandated shutdowns (34%)

Another APAC finding was that 94% of respondents there had cited they were “evaluating”, “accelerating implementation of”, or “had implemented” Zero Trust frameworks in their organizations—slightly higher than for the US (93%) and EMEA (91%).

According to the firm’s Senior Director of Strategic Business for APAC, Nick Savvides, the immediate requirements for home network connectivity and home-based equipment availability had led to many APAC organizations struggling at the beginning of the pandemic.

“Home users had to organize broadband, new devices had to be purchased, and processes had to change. There were also contractual complexities, with many business process outsourcing providers stating in their contracts that services had to be delivered from specific sites. And in the regulated industries across APAC, requirements for certain security controls prevented the adoption of cloud services. The many data sovereignty considerations in place also impeded rapid remote-working transitions.”

The survey, commissioned by Forcepoint, was conducted across US respondents from companies with more than US$1bn in revenue, while 42% of Europe and Asia Pacific region respondents came from companies with US$500m to US$999m in revenue.