BY: Michael Johnson, CSIO, TREND Health Partners
In 2024, the global average cost of a data breach hit $4.88 million, a 10 percent jump year-over-year, and in the U.S. healthcare sector specifically, it soared to $9.48 million per incident. Yet many organizations still evaluate security vendors by the flashiest features on a spec sheet: firewall throughput, SIEM dashboards, zero-trust overlays. Those capabilities are simply table stakes. What truly distinguishes a partner you can depend on is culture, the habits, behaviors, and shared mindset that turn technology into real defense.
Certifications such as SOC 2 Type II and HITRUST are non-negotiable, but too often they become dusty trophies on a shelf. The most resilient security cultures treat audit reports not as one-and-done checkboxes but as living documents. They convene quarterly reviews to discuss findings, drill into lessons learned, and adjust roadmaps based on evolving gaps. When a vendor candidly shares “here’s what we fixed since last year” and “here’s where we still need to improve,” you glimpse a culture that embraces accountability, rather than hiding behind polished slides.
Embedding Human-Centric Security
More than nine in ten breaches trace back to human error, according to Mimecast’s 2024 State of Human Risk report. This reality demands more than annual compliance videos. Leading CISOs partner with vendors who design security training as ongoing dialogue: short, scenario-based simulations that replace hour-long lectures; real-time phishing drills with instant feedback rather than shame; and recognition programs that reward employees for surfacing suspicious messages. When a vendor’s own leadership team shares candid incident postmortems in company-wide forums, it signals that security truly lives at every level.
Expanding the Threat Lens
Yesterday’s headlines about ransomware and credential stuffing pale next to today’s sophisticated schemes. In Verizon’s 2025 Data Breach Investigations Report, ransomware “accounts for 75 percent of breaches in the System Intrusion attack pattern.” Meanwhile, threat actors are embedding AI-generated deepfakes into spear-phishing campaigns and deploying “IT mule” programs that route infected laptops through unwitting insiders. An effective partner publishes regular briefings on geopolitical motivations, anonymized insider-threat trends, and new AI-enabled attack vectors, demonstrating they’re playing the long game, not hawking the latest bolt-on tool.
Making Zero Trust a Living Practice
Zero-trust isn’t a checkbox; it’s a mindset woven into every process. Today, 47 percent of healthcare organizations already have a defined zero-trust initiative in place, with another 38 percent planning one within 6–12 months [redoxengine.com]. The best security cultures insist on continuous credential validation, strict least-privilege policies, and rigorous vetting for contractors and browser extensions alike. They enforce full-disk encryption on every endpoint and monitor VPN sessions for anomalous activity, publishing the policies and enforcement metrics so you can see how rigorously controls are applied.
Fortifying Against AI-Fueled Spoofing
A few seconds of stolen audio or video can spawn remarkably convincing impersonations of executives, paving the way for fraudulent wire transfers or data exfiltration. In real-world phishing simulations, the median time to click a malicious link is just 21 seconds, and only another 28 seconds before credentials are entered. Top-tier partners conduct red-team exercises using AI-driven deepfakes and then walk through dual-channel verification protocols, texting known numbers or jumping on quick video calls, to harden your human firewall.
True resilience emerges from continuous learning loops. After every tabletop exercise or real incident, a culture-minded vendor convenes a blameless postmortem that spans IT, Finance, HR, and front-line staff. Lessons learned feed into updated playbooks, fresh training modules, and refined hiring profiles. They help you establish “Security Champions” in every department, empowering those who surface risks. Over time, this collaborative ethos transforms security from a specialized silo into an organizational muscle.
The Partner-Selection Playbook
When it’s time to choose or renew a security partner, technology demos alone won’t suffice. Instead, ask them to walk you through:
- Audit evolution: How have you turned last year’s SOC 2/HITRUST findings into continuous improvement projects?
- Behavioral metrics: Which KPIs do you track to measure reductions in human-risk behaviors?
- Threat intelligence breadth: How do you surface and share emerging AI and geopolitical threat patterns?
- Zero-trust discipline: How do you enforce least-privilege controls end-to-end?
- Cultural continuity: How does your security ethos flow from the C-suite to the help desk?
By focusing on culture and behavior first, technology second, you’ll equip your revenue-cycle operation with a partner that doesn’t just sell tools, but sustains a security mindset. In cybersecurity, features keep you in the match; culture wins it.
This article is part of TREND Health Partners’ thought leadership series on strengthening the healthcare financial ecosystem. We believe that true security isn’t just about technology, it’s built on culture, collaboration, and shared accountability. To explore more insights on a people-first approach to cybersecurity and revenue-cycle resilience, click here to read more from our team.