Integrating DORA Principles into Essential 8 Strategies
Meeba Gracy
Jan 30, 2025
What if the tools you rely on to protect your organization’s networks are only solving part of the problem?
The Essential Eight has long been a trusted framework for securing IT systems. Still, as cyber threats grow more sophisticated, strategies that address resilience on a deeper, more dynamic level are needed.
This is where the Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA), a regulation tailored to the financial sector, comes in. It is designed to withstand operational disruptions and ensure continuity.
Now, the question arises: can these two distinct approaches work together to create a seamless, fortified defense?
Let’s explore how these frameworks intersect and the potential they hold when integrated.
TL;DR
DORA ensures financial entities in the EU, such as banks and insurance companies, can withstand operational disruptions and remain resilient. |
The Essential Eight focuses on eight key cybersecurity strategies, including patch management, multi-factor authentication, and regular backups. |
Integrating DORA and Essential Eight blends technical controls with regulatory compliance. |
What is DORA?
DORA, or the Digital Operational Resilience Act, is a regulation designed to protect networks and information systems across the EU’s financial sector. It’s a mandatory framework to ensure banks, insurance companies, investment firms, and similar entities remain secure and resilient, even during severe operational disruptions.
Why is it so critical?
If ICT (Information and Communication Technology) risks aren’t adequately managed, disruptions can ripple across borders, impacting financial services, businesses, entire sectors, and potentially the broader economy.
DORA exists to strengthen the financial sector’s digital operational resilience and safeguard its stability.
Key areas covered by DORA are:
- ICT Risk Management: Establishing a framework to address and mitigate ICT risks
- Third-Party Risk Management: Monitoring and ensuring resilience standards for ICT service providers
- Resilience Testing: Conducting basic and advanced tests to strengthen ICT systems
- ICT Incidents: Managing and reporting ICT-related incidents
- Information Sharing: Exchanging intelligence on cyber threats and vulnerabilities
- Third-Party Oversight: Ensuring compliance and reducing risks with critical ICT providers
What are Essentials Eight?
The Essential Eight is a set of strategies designed to protect organizations’ internet-connected IT networks from cyber threats. While these principles can be adapted for enterprise mobility and operational technology networks, they were specifically created for IT systems, so unique environments may need different approaches for certain cyber risks.
Notably, it is developed by the Australian Signa