Know your cyber security.

Martin Coleman

Founder, Managing Director

My passion lies in helping clients, decoding business challenges into simple, cost-effective IT solutions. With 30 years of IT experience, I've led, coached and enabled countless people, from budding Unix system administrators to new technical sales recruits, with the skills to enhance data storage, database and application performance, networking, and security.

I've had the privilege of working with community clients like The Good Guys and The Uniting Church, and giants like the Bank of New York and JP Morgan,  AOL, Telstra, CommBank, ANZ Bank, NAB. and mid-market Australian MSPs.

My journey is filled with diverse experiences, including creating advanced automation scripts (like an early AI neural network of scripts and functions) and navigating the complexities of secure software development and release cycles, approving security changes across retail banking networks. I've gained a deep perspective across all eight information security domains: security & risk, asset security, security architecture & engineering, identity and access management, security assessment and testing, security operations, and software development security.

Inspired by a friend whose architecture firm (<20 employees) was hacked and ransomwared for $100,000 AUD, only to find their IT Provider/MSP (Managed Service Provider) hadn't changed passwords, then hacked again within a year for a similar reason & ransom, then firing their MSP, I've seen a huge gap in small business cybersecurity support and advice. Advice, skills & solutions are mostly geared to deep pockets and larger teams. Moreover, the MSPs catering to SMBs often face their own set of skills & budget challenges, as highlighted by my friend's experience.

As a small business owner, people coach and mentor, I hear small business owners crying out for help to bolster their cyber resilience and fend off the bad guys, help that's tailored to their small business, not the Bank of New York types.

Through Cyber Shield Advisors, I aim to share straightforward strategies and processes that I've learned over 30 years.

I welcome the opportunity to help you navigate the cyber threat landscape effectively, maximise your existing IT investments, keep the bad guys at bay and keep it simple - SMB simple and cost-effective.

Learning from mistakes is wise, but learning from others' experiences is even wiser. I'm here to share the wisdom gleaned from both successes and setbacks spanning 30 years.

If cybersecurity concerns loom large for you, whether you're just starting to think about your defences, recovering from an incident, or looking to prevent future attacks, I'm here to help. Let's embark on this journey to cyber resilience together.

Warmly,

Martin

  We are a small business passionate about helping other small businesses connect safely. 

We handle the tech cyber jargon with your MSP/IT provider, freeing you to focus on your business.

With over 30 years of IT experience and knowledge, we are uniquely able to provide a comprehensive assessment of your technology assets, with experience in data protection, intrusion detection, data loss prevention, backup and recovery, vulnerability & risk assessment, remote access, network access, email protection, data classification and even 3rd party vendor risk assessments. Your suppliers should have at least the same cyber security level as you do.

Our business is 100% Australian sovereign: risk assessors are Australian citizens, and all analysis is completed onshore. Police background checks are performed.

Your confidentiality is assured. We aim to strengthen your cyber resilience by working closely with you and your existing MSP/IT provider in either a one-off health check or ongoing checks as your business evolves.

We are a small business helping other small businesses strengthen Cyber Shields.

Our Cyber Health Check Assessments align to global practices, assuring you the highest standards in Cyber Shields.

Cyber Security standards are important. They have been developed by large organisations, and governments, and have stood the test of time. They're also a great yardstick to measure your progress, using standards accepted by insurers and business entities, like supply chain partners.

We don't create dangerous gaps by deviating from these standards with a proprietary set of controls.

Our assessments align with global frameworks such as NIST, CIS, CSA, ASD Essential 8, assuring you the highest confidence in our recommendations following a health check.