Geopolitical Threat Assessment for Insider Threat Programs 

Understanding which external actors might target your people, systems or supply chain is fundamental to designing an effective Insider Threat Program. Our Geopolitical Threat Assessment translates strategic intelligence into operationally relevant insight so you can prioritise scenarios, harden controls and align detection and response to plausible adversary behaviour.

We apply the MPS People Security Risk Management Geopolitical Threat Actor Assessment Model to map who could threaten your organisation, what they are capable of, where and when they are most likely to act, how they would strike, and why they would target you, producing a clear, defensible basis for insider threat scenario development and mitigation.

The assessment begins with identification of relevant threat actors. We consider state and nonstate adversaries, cyber criminals, organised crime, activists and lone actors, and examine which of these actors have previously targeted your sector or could be incentivised to do so. This step is informed by opensource reporting, industry intelligence, and government advisories so the assessment captures both strategic intent and observed tactics relevant to Australia and your operating footprint.

We then evaluate capabilities and intentions to understand what these actors might attempt and how sophisticated their methods could be. That analysis differentiates opportunistic malicious acts from targeted espionage or influence campaigns, testing scenarios, such as spearphishing, socialmedia profiling, supply chain compromise of managed service providers, and covert recruitment of insiders. Assessing capability and intent lets us scope realistic attack vectors and judge the likely impact to your critical assets and services.

Geography and timing are core to prioritisation. The assessment specifies where threats are likely to originate and where their effects would be felt, from foreign influence operations affecting policy or reputational risk to localized disruption at critical sites. We identify temporal triggers and windows of heightened risk, such as political events, economic pressure points, or organisational transitions, and advise when threat hunting and heightened monitoring are warranted.

Crucially, we analyse methods and attack vectors to show how adversaries could exploit your people and systems. This includes detailed consideration of social engineering, network intrusion, insider recruitment, and targeting of thirdparty providers.

We map these methods to existing controls and detectability gaps, producing scenario narratives that feed directly into plans, training and technical monitoring rules. Where relevant, we also assess how opensource intelligence and social media profiling could be used to identify and manipulate specific employees, emphasising mitigations such as strengthened digital hygiene and reporting channels.

Understanding motive completes the picture. Analysing why adversaries might target your organisation, whether for economic disruption, erosion of defence capability, or reputational damage, helps prioritise resources and tailor countermeasures. Motive analysis also informs communications, escalation thresholds and decisions about law enforcement or national security referrals when incidents meet specific criteria.

Deliverables are practical and designed for operational use. You receive a threat actor catalogue tailored to your industry sector, a set of prioritised insider threat scenarios with impact and likelihood ratings, suggested mitigations mapped to each scenario, and recommended monitoring and escalation criteria.

We provide source references and a confidence rating for each judgement so decisionmakers can weigh uncertainty in planning. The assessment can be integrated into your wider risk register, incident response plans and tabletop exercises to validate assumptions and strengthen readiness.

We engage crossfunctional stakeholders throughout the process, security, IT, HR, legal and business unit leads, so findings are contextualised and feasible. Where appropriate, we incorporate government advisories and liaise with intelligence liaison channels to ensure alignment with national threat guidance. The result is a defensible, intelligenceled foundation for scenario modelling, screening priorities and targeted capability investments.

If you need to understand who might exploit insider vulnerabilities against your organisation and how to prioritise your defensive effort, contact us to scope a Geopolitical Threat Assessment tailored to your sector, footprint and risk appetite.