Your Biotech Doesn’t Need More Alerts. It Needs Someone Accountable at 2 A.M.
Why 24/7 Security Is an Operating Decision, Not a Staffing Wish
There is a sentence we hear constantly in growing organizations:
“Our internal IT team handles security.”
That statement may be technically correct.
It can also conceal enormous risk.
The issue is not whether the internal IT team is talented.
The issue is whether leadership has quietly assigned a 24-hour responsibility to people working an eight-to-ten-hour day.
Those are not the same thing.
The 2023 attack against Enzo Biochem gives biotech leadership a painful example of why this distinction matters.
According to investigators, attackers entered Enzo’s environment using administrator credentials, installed malicious software and generated significant suspicious network activity. The company’s firewall detected and blocked many malicious connection attempts. Yet Enzo personnel did not discover the attackers for several days because there was no process in place to monitor for or notify personnel of the suspicious activity.
Before the attack was discovered, attackers exfiltrated information. Enzo later reported unauthorized access to clinical-test information belonging to approximately 2.47 million individuals, including potential exposure of roughly 600,000 Social Security numbers.
This is not a story about a company owning no cybersecurity technology.
It is a story about the distance between detecting a signal and responding to a threat.
Your biggest vulnerability may be human capacity
Smaller biotech organizations face an uncomfortable economics problem.
You need enterprise-level security attention long before you have enterprise-level security headcount.
A $75 million biotech company can possess research worth far more than its annual revenue.
A company approaching a clinical milestone can hold intellectual property that represents years of scientific work.
A growing life-sciences firm can rely on cloud infrastructure, outside researchers, CROs, laboratory partners, consultants and remote employees.
Yet its internal security organization may consist of one director, a security engineer or an IT team that also happens to own cybersecurity.
That creates an imbalance.
The value and complexity of what must be protected can grow much faster than the team responsible for protecting it.
The wrong response is to blame IT.
The right response is to acknowledge the capacity problem before an attacker exposes it for you.
Stop confusing alert delivery with security coverage
A common security model looks better on paper than it performs in practice.
- The endpoint platform generates an alert.
- The firewall generates another.
- Cloud security produces something else.
- The SIEM forwards an email.
- A ticket is opened.
- Everyone technically did what the system was designed to do.
But at 2:13 a.m., nobody is actively investigating.
That is not 24/7 security.
That is 24/7 alert generation.
There is a huge difference.
In the Enzo incident, the company’s own SEC disclosures later said the cyberattack severely curtailed its clinical reference-testing capability and forced outsourcing of significant testing activity, increasing costs and hurting services revenue.
For a biotech organization, imagine the equivalent consequence.
- Research teams lose access to critical systems.
- A compromised identity provides access to cloud repositories.
- Third-party credentials are abused.
- Laboratory operations slow down.
- A development milestone slips.
- Executives must explain the incident to partners, customers, investors or the board.
The danger isn’t merely that attackers encrypted something.
The danger is that the organization loses control of the timeline.
Attackers don’t care about your staffing model
Cyber risk does not disappear at 5:00 p.m.
Your internal team may go home.
Attackers do not.
That does not mean every biotech needs to build a 15-person internal SOC.
In many companies under $500 million in revenue, attempting to recreate an enterprise SOC internally may be economically irrational.
Consider what true round-the-clock coverage requires
- Not one talented security engineer.
- Coverage requires enough people to handle nights, weekends, holidays, vacations, illness, turnover, simultaneous incidents and escalation.
- It also requires different experience levels.
- Someone must recognize suspicious activity.
- Someone must investigate it.
- Someone must understand identity attacks.
- Someone must understand endpoints.
- Someone must understand cloud activity.
- Someone must know when containment is justified.
- And someone must communicate clearly with executives when a technical incident becomes a business event.
Buying another security platform does not solve that staffing problem.
This is where managed security should be evaluated differently
Managed security services should not be viewed simply as outsourcing cybersecurity.
That framing is too shallow.
For a growing biotech, the strategic value is access to security operating capacity the company may not be able to justify building internally yet.
That includes analysts available after hours, broader incident experience, structured escalation, investigation procedures and defined service levels.
But biotech leaders should be demanding.
“24/7 SOC” on a proposal means very little by itself.
Ask whether somebody actually investigates alerts 24/7.
Ask whether the provider commits contractually to response times based on severity.
Then ask what “response” means.
- Opening the alert?
- Sending an email?
- Calling your IT director?
- Beginning an investigation?
Those are completely different service levels.
The strongest security model defines the distinction.
What I would demand before trusting an MSSP
Start with investigation responsibility.
Who owns an alert after it arrives? If responsibility immediately transfers back to your internal IT team, you may have purchased monitoring without solving the capacity problem.
Next examine response times.
High-priority incidents should have documented service levels. There is no value in advertising 24/7 coverage if a critical event can sit uninvestigated for hours.
Then examine containment authority.
Can the security provider isolate an endpoint or disable a compromised account under preapproved conditions? Or must analysts spend valuable time hunting down an executive for permission while an attacker continues moving?
Look at escalation depth.
If the first analyst cannot determine what is happening, who takes over?
Look at biotech business context.
Does the response plan distinguish between an employee laptop and an identity with access to research repositories, laboratory environments, regulated information or important third parties?
Finally, look at evidence.
Leadership should receive reporting showing:
- What was detected.
- What was investigated.
- How quickly it was handled.
- What was contained.
- Where control gaps remain.
Security maturity is difficult to defend when all leadership can show is a collection of invoices for tools.
The Enzo financial story matters too
The consequences of Enzo’s incident continued well beyond April 2023.
In 2024, Enzo agreed to a $4.5 million multistate settlement regarding the company’s security practices. In January 2025, the company entered a separate $7.5 million class-wide settlement agreement connected to litigation arising from the ransomware incident.
That is why conversations about managed security should not begin with:
“How much does an MSSP cost?”
The better executive question is:
“What level of exposure are we accepting by continuing to operate the way we operate today?”
Those are very different conversations.
The question biotech leadership needs to answer
Your internal IT team may be doing outstanding work.
That still doesn’t mean it should carry the entire security burden.
Mature leadership recognizes when a responsibility has become larger than the team assigned to it.
Managed security services can provide after-hours coverage, specialized security experience, contractual response expectations and additional investigative capacity without requiring the biotech company to build that entire capability internally.
That is not an argument for blindly outsourcing security.
It is an argument for designing a security model around the company’s actual risk rather than its current headcount.
So take the ransomware question off the table for a moment.
Ask something simpler.
At 2:00 tomorrow morning, suppose an account with access to valuable research begins behaving strangely.
An endpoint starts communicating with suspicious infrastructure.
Your security tools generate alerts.
Who sees them?
Who investigates?
Who decides whether they matter?
Who has permission to act?
How quickly?
And who is accountable if nobody responds?
If those answers depend on someone happening to see an email the next morning, your biotech company does not have 24/7 security.
It has 24/7 technology with part-time human coverage.
As your company grows, adds researchers, expands cloud usage, creates more intellectual property and introduces more third parties, that gap becomes more consequential.
The final question for leadership isn’t whether your current security model works today.
It’s harder:
Can the model you’re relying on today protect the company you’re trying to become?
About Single Point of Contact
Single Point of Contact is an experienced MSP in the biotech industry and is a valuable partner, providing specialized knowledge in implementing robust backup strategies and ensuring network security and stability. With deep understanding of regulatory requirements such as HIPAA and FDA’s 21 CFR Part 11, Single Point of Contact safeguards sensitive research data, clinical trial information, and intellectual property. They offer tailored solutions, including automated backups, real-time monitoring, and disaster recovery plans, minimizing downtime and data loss. By managing security protocols, they protect against cyber threats, allowing biotech companies to focus on innovation while ensuring compliance and uninterrupted operations. This expertise enhances productivity and reduces risk. Contact us today to discover more about how we can help your biotech firm with DR, backup and security.
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