What’s included in a full cybersecurity risk assessment?
- External penetration testing
- Vulnerability scanning
- Network security review
- Compliance gap analysis (CMMC, HIPAA, PCI DSS)*
- Employee cyber hygiene evaluation and simulated phishing attacks
- Policy and procedure review
- Cyber liability risk evaluation
- Executive summary report with actionable recommendations
* = optional and/or as applicable
Why should you have a cybersecurity risk assessment performed?
A cybersecurity risk assessment helps business owners and leaders:
Cyber Risk Assessment FAQs
The use of artificial intelligence (AI) to target dental practices has been increasingly used to make familiar attack methods easier to scale. These practices are an attractive target because they hold sensitive patient information and insurance/payment details, often rely on several outside vendors and rarely have a dedicated IT team. Attackers are not necessarily using AI to create new attack methods, but are leveraging the tool to increase the speed, personalization, quality, and volume of attacks. The result is that dental practices are more exposed than ever to bad actors.
There are now several new attack patterns, including:
- Highly personalized phishing. Attackers can use public information from a practice website, LinkedIn, social media, staff bios, and online reviews to quickly create emails that sound like they came from a dentist, office manager, IT provider, lab, insurer, or referral partner.
- AI-assisted impersonation and payment fraud. Generative AI makes it easier to mimic an executive’s writing style, generate believable invoices, and create convincing text or voice impersonations. In a dental setting, the likely targets include payroll changes, wire/ACH requests, supplier payments, refunds, insurance communications, and requests purportedly coming from the practice.
- Faster reconnaissance and vulnerability discovery. AI can help an attacker collect information about a practice’s exposed systems, software, vendors, and employees and assist with analyzing potential vulnerabilities.
- Lower barrier to malware and ransomware operations. AI doesn’t magically create access to a dental network, but it can help less-skilled criminals write or modify code, troubleshoot attack tools, and produce the material that delivers malicious software.
- Attacking the practice through third parties. Dental offices depend heavily on practice-management systems, cloud services, imaging platforms, labs, billing vendors, MSPs, and other business associates. An attacker who compromises one trusted relationship can create unusually believable communications or potentially reach multiple practices.
The patient data most attractive to bad actors is any information which can be monetized, used for identity fraud, or to impersonate a patient. Unfortunately, AI can help attackers quickly analyze stolen records, connect data points across sources, and generate several very convincing scams. The data at the highest risk include identity information (date of birth, address, etc.), insurance and financial data, dental records, dental images and photographs and credentials that provide access to patient communication. Dentists need to carefully protect complete patient profiles, since the more information available, the more valuable it is to a bad actor.
Yes. AI tools can create a new security and privacy risk especially when they have access to patient records, email, scheduling, imaging or billing software. The topmost risks include patient data entered into AI tools, third-party or vendor exposure, prompt injection attacks, AI mistakes impacting the clinical record, and the creation of new credential and integration points. The riskiest situation arises when an AI tool has access to both Protected Health Information (PHI) and the permission to act. In this situation, a successful attacker could review patient information and then use AI to communicate with patients.
If a suspected AI related breach has occurred the team should disable the affected AI tool, preserve logs and other evidence, contact Adams Brown, attempt to identify what data was exposed, change compromised passwords, complete a HIPAA breach risk assessment (if PHI was involved), determine whether patient or law enforcement should be notified and document what happened in specific detail.
The most important thing is to contain the incident, protect PHI, preserve evidence and follow breach reporting requirements. For a full break-response checklist, see our guide on Responding to a Cybersecurity Incident.
A cyber risk assessment is a structured evaluation of an organization’s technology, security practices and potential exposure to cyber threats. It examines systems, networks, policies, access controls and employee practices to identify vulnerabilities that could lead to ransomware attacks, data breaches, financial fraud or operational disruption. This assessment reduces the likelihood of an incident and the severity of impact on operations.
Companies use cyber risk assessments to help direct spending to resolve the most critical weaknesses, ensure compliance with government/industry regulations and reduce the challenges of expensive data breaches or downtime. It can also result in lower rates on cyber insurance coverage.
A cyber risk assessment, also know as a cybersecurity risk assesment, helps you identify weaknesses before cybercriminals exploit them. An assessment provides visibility into vulnerability, assists with regulatory and legal compliance requirements, helps drive resource allocation, third party and supply chain risk evaluation, and supports breach prevention and incident response planning. These activities result in improved incident response planning, bolstered business continuity, and guides future investments to target the areas of high risk.
Since an assessment is a comprehensive review of a company’s digital footprint, it focuses on evaluating digital assets, identifying vulnerabilities, measuring business impacts and providing a prioritized remediation plan. This allows management to implement changes immediately in the areas of highest priority.
The key components of a cyber risk assessment include:
- Full risk assessment – Review of systems, processes, user access and controls.
- Business impact analysis – Understand how a breach could affect operations, finances and reputation.
- Vulnerability testing – Scans across servers, endpoints, cloud tools and key applications.
- Network penetration testing (as scoped) – Real‑world validation to see what an attacker could actually do.
- Control review – Patching, backups, MFA, endpoint tools, passwords, logging — all evaluated and explained.
- Compliance Mapping: NIST, CIS, HIPAA, PCI, CMMC or other frameworks as needed.
- Threat Exposure Summary – Clear, jargon‑free insights for leadership and boards.
- Prioritized Remediation Plan – What to fix first, why it matters and how to tackle it.
- 12–18-Month Strategic Roadmap – A steady plan with budget ranges and milestones.
- Live Review Session – A walkthrough with our cybersecurity consultants so nothing gets lost in translation.
The assessment may review network infrastructure, computers, servers, cloud systems, remote access practices, user permissions, authentication controls, email security, data protection measures, backup procedures and existing cybersecurity tools. Policies, incident response procedures and employee security awareness may also be examined.
Penetration testing may be included as part of a comprehensive assessment. During a penetration test, cybersecurity professionals simulate real-world attacks to determine whether identified vulnerabilities can be exploited. Penetration testing and vulnerability scanning are different but complementary tools that can provide a more complete view of an organization’s cybersecurity risk.
Yes. An assessment can identify weaknesses that may increase the likelihood or impact of a ransomware attack. These may include outdated software, inadequate backups, excessive administrative privileges, weak authentication controls, unsecured remote access and insufficient employee training.
It may evaluate employee cybersecurity practices through interviews, security-awareness reviews or simulated phishing exercises. The goal is not to punish employees, but to identify areas where training and clearer procedures can strengthen the organization’s first line of defense.
Yes. An assessment can identify gaps between an organization’s current controls and the requirements of applicable cybersecurity or data-protection frameworks. Adams Brown Technology Specialists assists organizations with compliance involving frameworks such as HIPAA, PCI DSS, CMMC and CJIS.
Risks are typically prioritized according to factors such as the likelihood of exploitation, the severity of the vulnerability, the sensitivity of the affected information and the potential financial or operational impact. This allows the organization to address its most significant exposures first. In fact, the prioritization of risks is one of the most important benefits of an assessment. It provides management with clear direction on how to address the highest risk issues first.
Organizations should conduct assessments regularly and whenever significant changes occur. Examples include opening a new location, adopting new cloud platforms, completing an acquisition, changing IT providers, introducing remote work or becoming subject to new compliance requirements. The appropriate frequency depends on the organization’s size, industry, risk profile and regulatory obligations.