Private Security Isn't Just Bodyguards — Your Digital Life Needs Protection Too

When you think of private security, you probably picture close protection officers, armoured vehicles, and someone scanning the crowd while you walk to your car. That’s the physical side, and it’s important. But in the digital world, things are a lot hotter — and a lot harder to protect.

If you’ve got something to lose, whether that’s wealth, a business, sensitive deals, or simply your privacy, then your cyber security needs to be taken just as seriously as the bloke standing at your front gate.

It Starts With People, Not Technology

Here’s what catches most people off guard: the biggest vulnerability in any security setup isn’t the software. It’s the people.

Your staff might be loyal, brilliant, and hardworking — but all it takes is one slip. Maybe someone uses ChatGPT to book your travel without realising they’ve just handed your itinerary to a third party. Maybe a convincing caller talks a well-meaning team member into sharing a password. This kind of thing is called social engineering, and it’s one of the most effective ways attackers get in.

That’s why good security starts with education and vetting. Training your team to spot dodgy emails, phone calls, and requests is absolutely essential. And vetting — properly checking who you’re hiring and who has access to what — can’t be an afterthought.

Think Layers, Not Walls

Imagine your security as an onion rather than a single wall. Each layer adds protection, and together they make life very difficult for anyone trying to get through. On their own, any single layer can be breached. Combined, they become a serious headache for attackers.

This means things like endpoint security (basically, making sure laptops, phones, and other devices are locked down and monitored), firewalls (digital barriers that control what traffic gets in and out of your network), regular security audits, and strict policies about who can access what.

But — and this is key — your security is only ever as good as the weakest link. If the company looking after your fleet or your properties hasn’t been properly vetted, that’s a gap. If your personal habits are sloppy, that’s a gap. You’re not infallible, and neither is anyone else.

Compartmentalise Everything

One concept that’s really worth borrowing from the intelligence world is compartmentalisation). The idea is simple: not everyone needs to know everything. If one area gets compromised — say, access to one of your properties — it shouldn’t automatically give an attacker the keys to your entire life, your business partners, or your family.

Keep things separated. Limit access. Make sure that a breach in one area doesn’t cascade into a disaster across the board.

It’s Not Just Cyber Security — It’s Information Security

Here’s where a lot of providers get it wrong. They focus purely on the technical side — the firewalls, the scanning, the software updates — and call it a day. That’s a tick-box exercise, not real protection.

True security is holistic. It means understanding your specific threat model (essentially, who might want to come after you, why, and how), and then designing defences around that. It means having disaster recovery plans in place, because breaches aren’t a matter of if — they’re a matter of when.

And it’s not static. You can’t set it up once and forget about it. Threats evolve, your circumstances change, and your security needs to keep pace.

When Big Deals Are on the Table

This is where things get particularly interesting. If you’re involved in major business deals — mergers, acquisitions, property transactions — the stakes go through the roof. A resourceful adversary who stands to lose millions from a deal going through has every incentive to come after you. And these days, one skilled individual with the right tools can do the kind of damage that used to take a whole team months to accomplish.

This is where security becomes more like counterintelligence. It’s not just about defending; it’s about being proactive. Who might benefit from disrupting your deal? Who are the likely adversaries? What are their capabilities? You don’t need to know the details of every deal — but understanding the landscape lets you anticipate threats before they materialise.

Physical and Digital Must Work Together

If you already have a close protection team handling your physical security — route planning, transport, property security — they need to be part of the conversation. Physical and digital threats don’t exist in separate universes. Someone targeting your business might start with a cyber attack and escalate to something physical, or vice versa.

An integrated approach, where your physical security team and your cyber security team are working from the same threat model, is the only way to avoid dangerous blind spots.

So What Does Good Security Actually Look Like?

It starts with a conversation. Understanding you, your business, your family, and the people around you. From there, it’s about building a tailored risk management plan that covers education and training, thorough vetting of staff and third parties, layered technical defences, compartmentalisation of sensitive information, proactive threat intelligence, disaster recovery procedures, and close integration with physical security.

It’s a partnership built on trust. It can feel invasive at times — that’s unavoidable when the goal is genuine protection rather than a superficial checkbox exercise. But when done right, it gives you the confidence to focus on what matters, knowing that someone’s got your back in the digital world just as much as in the physical one.