Build an executive cybersecurity programme that connects personal exposure with corporate identity, assistants, travel and incident-response responsibilities.
Assign ownership across the organisation
Begin with the decisions executives can authorise and the information they can access. Finance, legal, communications, IT and physical security may each own part of the risk. Name a programme owner and agree how personal-device concerns can be escalated without disclosing private content unnecessarily.
Use a responsibility matrix for enrolment, technical changes, urgent approvals and communications. Include deputies for travel or absence. A personal adviser and a corporate administrator should not silently acquire the same access rights.
Protect delegated access and payment instructions
Map mailbox delegation, shared calendars, cloud collaboration, executive assistants and external advisers. Review stale privileges and recovery channels. Apply phishing-resistant authentication where supported and test that emergency access does not depend on one unavailable person.
Treat unusual payment, beneficiary and confidential-document requests as verification events. Confirm through a previously established channel and involve a second authorised approver when required. A familiar voice or a message in an existing thread is not sufficient evidence of authority.
Connect monitoring to the corporate response team
Agree which endpoint, identity and email signals the SOC will receive and which personal assets remain outside its visibility. Establish case ownership when an incident crosses a private account and a corporate tenant. Limit access to the minimum data needed for the investigation.
Exercise account takeover, a lost travel device and executive impersonation. Record who can revoke access, preserve records, notify affected teams and resume operations. Review actual handover delays and unresolved technical dependencies after the exercise.
Measure coverage and maintain it
Track enrolled assets, tested recovery methods, removed delegation, remediated findings and exercise actions. Alert counts alone do not demonstrate effective protection. Review changes when a person joins, changes role or leaves, or when assistants and advisers change.
TRUST-IT can scope executive digital protection alongside enterprise security and forensic readiness. Begin with a defined group and systems, establish operational ownership, and expand only after the programme works in practice.