Your Pen Test isn’t enough: Why Cyber Resilience requires a smarter framework

Consider this scenario: You’ve just completed a pen test. Your AV definitions are current. The firewall’s up. But two weeks later, your organisation is blindsided by a sophisticated phishing attack that bypassed all known defences. The breach was quiet, but costly.

Sadly, this is today’s reality. The cybersecurity landscape today is shifting and accelerating. And the traditional “point-in-time” approach to defense is no longer good enough. So how do you move from reactive firefighting to resilient, risk-based strategy?

Quite simply, it starts with reframing your security model around people, process and continuous preparedness, and keeping up to date with the latest security frameworks.

Cyber stakes are rising

Let’s face it: The numbers don’t lie; cyber risk is growing fast, and outdated security models are struggling to keep up. Just consider these statistics:

• In FY2023–24, the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) responded to over 1,100 cyber incidents, a sharp rise from previous years.
• Globally, the average cost of a data breach is now USD $4.45 million, according to IBM’s Cost of a Data Breach Report 2024.
• 82% of breaches involve a human element, from misconfiguration to social engineering (Verizon DBIR 2024).
• In Australia, the average cost of cybercrime per report for small businesses rose to $49,600, an 8% increase (cyber.gov.au).

What’s more, point tools and tick-the-box testing simply can’t keep pace. Security today demands adaptability, not just compliance.

Legal shift: Cybersecurity in the eyes of the law

To match this escalating threat landscape, the Australian Government enacted the Cyber Security Act 2024, a landmark reform designed to modernise the nation’s defences.

Effective from 30 May 2025, the new rules require businesses with annual turnover above $3 million (and those managing critical infrastructure) to report ransomware or cyber extortion payments to the ASD within 72 hours.

This means CISOs and IT leaders aren’t just dealing with reputational and operational consequences; they’re now navigating legal risk too.

Additionally, the Act also establishes a Cyber Incident Review Board, ensuring that significant breaches are analysed and contribute to broader lessons learned across industries.

So what’s the bottom line? Regulatory pressure is now firmly on the side of resilience, real-time response, and accountability. The era of reactive security is no longer viable, not just technically, but legally.

Why the old playbook no longer works

Against this backdrop, organisations have shifted away from static on-premise environments to cloud-first, API-connected, hybrid workplaces. But many security models haven’t kept up.

Penetration Testing

Still essential, but inherently limited. Pen tests are confined by scope and time, offering only a snapshot of risk in an environment that’s constantly evolving.

Signature-Based Tools

Solutions like antivirus and firewalls are reactive by nature. As threat actors adopt polymorphic malware, fileless attacks and AI-powered evasion, these defences are falling behind.

Therefore, while foundational, these tools are no longer sufficient on their own.

Evolving your security posture: What’s needed now

So what’s the answer? Security maturity today means going beyond tools to build systemic resilience. That means:

• Integrating automated threat detection and response
• Factoring in human behaviour and organisational process
• Adopting a risk-based approach to prioritise the most likely and impactful threats
• Continuously assessing, not just annually testing

Building a modern security framework

One of the most effective ways to evaluate and evolve your cyber security posture is by aligning to the NIST Cybersecurity Framework. This gives you:

-A maturity model across five pillars: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, Recover
-A baseline to assess gaps: technical, procedural, or cultural
-A roadmap to shift from reactive to proactive, with risk at the core

Complement this with tools like the MITRE ATT&CK Framework, which focuses not on malware signatures, but on attacker tactics, techniques, and behaviours, which is a far more durable foundation as threat vectors evolve.

Key insight: Think behaviour, not just signatures

Certainly, modern adversaries don’t follow rules. They adapt, experiment and escalate. That’s why smart organisations are shifting toward behaviour-based detection. Instead of chasing every new malware variant, they look for:

• Unusual access patterns
• Data exfiltration attempts
• Lateral movement within networks

In other words, they monitor what attackers do, not what they use. This mindset is at the core of a resilient defence posture.

Continuous monitoring means continuous improvement

In other words, cybersecurity is a lifecycle – and not simply a project – and it requires visibility that spans your entire environment:

• Did a recent software update introduce new vulnerabilities?
• Are new API connections creating unmonitored entry points?
• Has your risk profile changed with recent business expansion?

Let’s face it: What you fixed in March might not protect you in July. That’s why modern security teams embrace real-time visibility, continuous control assessments, and automated response.

Data breaches are inevitable

Here’s the hard truth: You can’t stop every breach. But you can build a system that:

• Prevents the most likely threats
• Contains breaches early
• Minimises impact to customers, revenue and reputation

Indeed, that’s the difference between a headline-grabbing crisis and a minor security event.

What sets resilient organisations apart?

So, what sets resilient organisations apart isn’t perfection? It’s actually ‘preparation.’ The companies leading the way – and kicking goals – aren’t immune to threats; instead, they’re simply better equipped to manage them.

In fact, these businesses operate with a risk-based framework that’s tailored to their unique environment.

They also maintain a real-time understanding of their threat exposure, enabling them to detect incidents quickly, respond with processes that align to human workflows, and recover with minimal disruption.

But they also lean on strategic partners who understand the evolving threat landscape and can help them stay ahead of what’s next.

Final word to the tech leader

Your business isn’t static. Neither are today’s threats. That’s why it’s it’s time to stop chasing compliance checkboxes and start building a cyber resilience strategy grounded in real risk, real behaviour, and real-time response.
If you’d like to explore how to assess your organisation’s maturity and build a smarter framework, we’re here to help.