Environmental protection goes beyond ESG

Why is Green cyber security so important?

At first you might ask, what is actually the difference between green cyber security and cyber security. The "green" in this IT security strategy tryies to not only make an organizational environment safer for users but also reduces the negative impact of the cyber technology on the environment.
When we look at the EU taxonomy in regards to ESG, we need to realize that our IT infrastructure consumes a lot of energy and in some cases also polutes our local environment. some datacenters use ground water and river water to cool its room temperature.
Eventually the warm water is often pumped back into the local water system. This leads to substantial problems for animals, plants and farmers in that vicinity.

Green Cyber security is complementary to ESG

The EU taxonomy of ESG also affects the IT infrastructure. This is where organisations can massively reduce its energy consumption. In todays developed world, companies consume a lot of energy for their IT, cooling systems, manufacturing and transport.

A IT expert responsible for IT security should regularly audit the IT environment to make sure that all systems are adequately protected against cyber threats as they are partly to be blamed for massive energy consumption when hackers try to break into many computer devices.

That is why ESG expects organizations to make an effort to also reduce the impact of their IT infrastructure on the environment and local community. Hence, it has become part of governance to ensure a green cyber security awareness is part of European business culture.

Book recommendation on ESG

Bookcover of the sustainable business idea

Don't miss out on how to drive your business to be sustainable, while avoiding the ugly side of ESG, which can be a great revenue driver when applied in a non-toxic way:

Get the 2022 edition of "The Sustainable Business Idea - A pocket guide to Environment, Social and Governance (ESG)" written by Christian Bartsch.

It is availabe at AmazonBarnes and Noble and other retailers:

ISBN: 979-8-8330-3548-1 Softcover
ASIN: B0BKWWJL4H Kindle edition

FAQ on Green IT and Green Cyber Security

Green IT (green information technology) is a best practice approach to reducing the environmental impact of the computing infrastructure of an organization. This is complemented by the EU taxonomy of ESG in relation to Green Cyber security.

Hence, the objective is to reduce pollution, water consumption, waste and energy consumption. Furthermore, the impact of IT on local communities are to be reduced as during manufacturing, usage and disposal of IT equipment we will experience an environmental consumption that affects wilrdlife and humans.

Green Information Technologies (Green IT) try to reduce and avoid unnecessary impacts on the environmental. Examples of Green IT include energy efficient software, hardware and data centers, server virtualization, and monitoring systems.

This also expands to the way the organizational perimeters are protected against cyber attacks as they usually generate substantial pollutants as cyber criminals manipulate the computer systems.