Target Seeks New Chief Information Officer After Data Breach – Bloomberg BusinessWeek

Target Profits Hit – ABC News

Target chief information officer resigns – Financial Times

Like the Super Bowl winning Seattle Seahawks, a winning formula for IT and Technology teams is to have a best in class defense and an offense that doesn’t turn the ball over but can score when it needs to. As mentioned in previous posts, the CIO’s and the Big TOE’s (Top Operations Executive) first and primary responsibility is to Protect the Brand! Losing customer trust, financial / privacy information and potentially their cash is an excellent way to irretrievably lose market share. While I cannot and won’t comment on the (in)adequacy or (un)appropriateness of Target’s security program, (see Krebs on Security link below) it highlights the dilemma of the tradeoffs between RTB (run the business) investments vs. TTB/ITB/GTB (transform/improve/grow the business) investments. At the end of the day, Target’s problem may not have been an investment decision at all, but flawed design(s), practices/policies, training or process issue (or all of the above), albeit with massive consequences.

Regardless, please review where you are trading off protecting the brand against cutting time to market, training, tools, staff and corners. Don’t be a Target.

Target And Neiman Marcus Just The Tip Of The Iceberg – More Retail Security Breaches To Come – Forbes

Target Hackers Broke in Via HVAC Company – Krebs on Security

Mike