Local councils teaming up to share finance platforms. Police forces joining together for firearms licensing. Universities collaborating on accelerators and research. These are just a few examples of multi-organisation service delivery — increasingly common in the UK public sector and beyond.
But while these models promise efficiency, scale, and better outcomes, they also introduce a serious question:
🧩 Who owns the cyber risk — and who’s watching the full picture?
A New Reality: Shared Services, Shared Exposure
In multi-organisation collaborations, risk is rarely siloed. And yet, cybersecurity strategy often is.
🔁 Shared platforms mean shared attack surfaces – One misconfigured integration can expose data across several partners.
🔍 No single team has full visibility – One council’s IT team can’t see what the police team is doing. One university department doesn’t know how the others are managing vendors.
📉 Security posture varies wildly across partners – Some organisations may have strong policies; others may not even meet Cyber Essentials standards.
⚖️ Legal and reputational accountability is shared – If a breach affects a shared platform, everyone’s name ends up in the press.
And yet, most teams are still acting independently — scanning their own systems (sometimes), storing their own data, and hoping it all holds together.
Why “Collaborate on Delivery” Must Include “Collaborate on Cyber”
Joint working arrangements cannot stop at procurement. If organisations deliver together, they must also assess and manage risk together.
✅ Visibility across boundaries – Can all partners see the state of shared systems, suppliers, and data access?
✅ Agreed cyber baselines – Is there a minimum standard (e.g. MFA, patching cycles, secure configurations) that every partner must meet?
✅ Group-level insights – Can leadership understand the total risk across the collaboration?
✅ Rapid response playbooks – If something goes wrong, who leads, who speaks, who owns the fix?
Use Case: Shared Police-Council Licensing Services
🚓 West Midlands Police and local councils operate shared firearms licensing services.
💻 They rely on a mix of police, council, and third-party systems — spanning databases, booking platforms, and communications tools.
⚠️ A breach in one system — say, a misconfigured external portal — could compromise data across multiple authorities.
Yet, unless there’s shared visibility and aligned risk management, each party is only managing their own corner, blind to the joint risk they share.
The Solution: Roll-Up Risk Strategy
Cyber Tzar enables multi-organisation collaborations to:
🟢 Scan systems by entity – Each organisation sees its own risks in real time
🔗 Roll up risk centrally – A combined dashboard shows group-level risk and trends
📊 Benchmark across partners – Understand which orgs are excelling — and where to provide support
📄 Generate unified board reports – Provide shared governance groups with consistent, clear updates
📍 Support compliance across partners – Map posture to frameworks like Cyber Essentials, ISO 27001, and NCSC CAF
Collaboration ≠ Complexity
Whether it’s a council-police service, university accelerator, or regional NHS research hub — working together doesn’t mean flying blind.
With the right tools and processes, shared service delivery can be matched by shared cyber oversight.
🧠 After all, your collaboration is only as strong as its weakest endpoint.
📡 Want to understand the total cyber risk across your collaboration?
🔗 Book a shared risk overview at cybertzar.com
