Senior Specialist - Technical Assurance at Equity Bank Kenya

Role Description:

The role holder will be responsible for overseeing the security framework to ensure security controls are in place in the Bank, identify threat scenarios, quantify risks and work with stakeholders to ensure effective mitigation controls are in place, and ensure compliance with all relevant regulatory requirements. Additionally, he/she will be responsible for overseeing group vulnerability posture (vulnerability management), performing Risk & Control Assessments and design of cybersecurity controls.

Responsibilities:

• Implement the Bank’s cyber security assurance program, enforce the cyber security policy / framework and ensure up-to-date information security policies, standards and cyber risk management plan are in place.
• Drive security and risk assessments with Technology, and work with the Information Security, Enterprise Risk and Audit teams across the Group to review compliance and audit requirements for Information Security and ensure they are addressed.
• Analyse and provide remediation guidance for identified weaknesses or vulnerabilities, validating and verifying appropriate remediation.
• Ensure that Equity Group maintains a current and comprehensive cyber asset and user register.
• Ensure that the Bank maintains a current enterprise-wide knowledge base of its users, devices, application and their relationships.
• Design cybersecurity controls with the consideration of users at all levels of the Bank, including internal (i.e. management and staff) and external users (i.e. contractors/consultants, business partners and service providers), and work closely with the various business and technology teams to identify and select the right security controls to protect Equity’s network & IT infrastructure, cloud and IoT solutions.
• Monitor the control environment, identifying security gaps, evaluating and implementing enhancements.
• Incorporate the utilization of scenario-based analysis to consider a material cyber-attack, mitigating actions, and identify potential control gaps.
• Ensure that the roles and responsibilities of managing cyber risks, including in emergency or crisis decision-making, are clearly defined, documented and communicated to relevant staff.
• Conduct assessments on the effectiveness of the approved cybersecurity program and provide detailed exceptions to the approved cybersecurity policies and procedures.
• Report on any residual risk or security exposures against the security standards, policies and noncompliance and provide actionable recommendations.
• Work with the application functions, network teams and IT infrastructure teams to identify and assist with the implementation of Security policy, process, people and technology improvements.
• Ensure that information systems meet the needs of Equity Group and that they comply with the overall business strategies, ERM framework, risk appetite and ICT policies.
• Evaluate outsourced/third-party technologies and hosting environments to ensure they provide adequate protection for the processing, transmission, and storage of Equity Group’s information; validating that security controls are designed properly, perform effectively and align to Group Information Security.
• Keep up to date with the latest security and technology developments, research/evaluate emerging security threats and ways to manage them.
• Participate in organizing of professional cyber related trainings to improve technical proficiency of staff and user awareness trainings for improved cyber hygiene.
• Recommend implementation of capabilities to enable an optimal Information Security control environment; directly responsible for significantly contributing to the overall security posture, stability and resiliency to the Equity environment and security solutions.
• Use of advanced analytic tools to determine emerging threat patterns and vulnerabilities.
• Ensure timely update of the incident response mechanism and Business Continuity Plan (BCP) based on the latest cyber threat intelligence gathered.
• Put in place BCP and disaster recovery test plans to ensure that the Bank can continue to function and meet its regulatory obligations in the event of an unforeseen attack through cyber-crime.
• Ensure adequate backups of critical IT systems and data, in line with predetermined recovery objectives, are carried out to a site that is unlikely to be affected by a disaster event at the main processing site.
• Conduct regular benchmarking with other companies and organizations within and outside the industry.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Information Technology, Information Security/Assurance, Engineering or similar area of study.
• Hold relevant industry certifications (CISSP, CEH, CISA, CISM, etc.).
• Minimum 6 years of experience, with at least 2 in management and 4 years in technical assurance.
• Experience in vulnerability management and penetration testing in applications, APIs, network devices configuration review, network architecture review etc.
• In-depth knowledge of security concepts such as cyber-attacks and techniques, threat vectors, risk management, incident management etc.
• Experience with industry standard frameworks (ISO 27000, NIST, PCI DSS).
• Knowledge of various operating system flavors including but not limited to Windows, Linux, Unix.
• Knowledge of applications, databases, middleware to address security threats against the same.
• Knowledge of a number of the following security concepts & controls: Strong Authentication, End Point Security, Internet Policy Enforcement, Firewalls, Web Content Filtering, Database Activity Monitoring (DAM), Public Key Infrastructure (PKI), Data Loss Prevention (DLP), Identity and Access Management (IAM).
• Ability to effectively provide briefing to the business stakeholders regarding ongoing security incidents and threat Levels.