The Last Of Us Part II Remastered: Thoughts From A First-Time Player

The Last of Us Part II hit PlayStation 4 exclusively in 2020. Developer Naughty Dog brought us back into the world of cordyceps, Fireflies, Ellie, and Joel alongside new threats and characters like the WLF, Abby, Yara, Lev, and more. Game Informer gave the game a 10 out of 10 – read the review here – and I would have agreed with that score in 2020. I still agree with that score today, too.

If I wrote what I want to say about The Last of Us Part II’s story, I’m sure you’d find it very familiar because it’s largely how I felt around the game’s original release. Instead, my wife, Gabriella LeBlanc, played through The Last of Us Part II Remastered’s story for the first time ever, mostly unspoiled of the adventure, and it was awesome listening to her thoughts in real-time about the game. I wanted to share those thoughts, so I interviewed her. Below are 20 questions about The Last of Us Part II’s story with answers from someone who beat it for the first time in 2024, unaware of the leaks that happened before the game’s 2020 launch, the fates of certain characters, the ending, and more. Enjoy (and be nice to her in the comments)!

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Playing The Last of Us Part II For The First Time In 2024

Game Informer’s Wesley LeBlanc: What did you think The Last of Us Part II would be about going into it, unspoiled by the internet?

Gabriella LeBlanc: I honestly did not have much of an idea. I remember watching the trailer way back when the game was being released the first time, just passively because you were watching, and thinking, “Weird, what does this have to do with anything?” and that was with an already very basic idea of what the first game was even about. It seemed like some kind of culty witch-hunt vibe, which definitely sounds cool, but had no idea what it had to do with The Last of Us, so I didn’t really know what to think.

What was the biggest surprise?

LeBlanc: The biggest surprise was not Joel’s death overall, but the timing. Unfortunately, I did know that Joel was going to die because I’d seen it on Twitter or something at some point, probably a meme or something. So I knew it was going to happen. But I did not think it was going to happen so fast. When it did, I was thinking, “Okay, for real now, what is this game going to be about?”

How did Joel’s death affect you? How do you feel about its place in the game’s narrative?

LeBlanc: Mostly just disbelief because of the timing, as I mentioned. Since I’ve finished the game, I like that it happens so fast. It just provides such a shock factor that they would kill the main character, and so quickly, that it made me want to keep playing to see how this would play out for Ellie.

After Joel’s death, what did you think the game’s plot was going to be? 

LeBlanc: At this point, I had a feeling that Ellie was going to go after his killer. She’s way too ruthless to let it slide, and I knew that it would eat away at her knowing the person who did this could get away.

The Last Of Us Part II Remastered: Thoughts From A First-Time Player

How do you feel about Ellie and Dina and their relationship in the first half of the game? 

LeBlanc: When they were first interacting in the game, I thought it was maybe a little shallow, that Dina was kind of using Ellie as a rebound from her breakup with Jesse. However, as time went on, it was clear that things were more serious and they both provided something that the other person needed. I think Dina (and later the baby) gave Ellie someone to take care of, a purpose, much like Joel needed Ellie as his purpose. For Dina, Ellie served as a capable, protective person to love and share her life with. It’s unfortunate that, in the end, they both lost those things. 

Shamblers are new. What’d you think of those enemies? 

LeBlanc: I pretty much saw them as the same thing as Bloaters, but they were able to attack you from afar by throwing acid (I think?) spores at you, which definitely added to the panic for me. I am, unfortunately, a very panic-driven player. By that, I mean something starts to attack me, and I start to panic, then suddenly forget what every single button on the controller does. This probably just shows how amateur I am at these types of games, but these enemies definitely added to the intensity of those moments because I was terrible at predicting how and where they were going to attack me. Were they going to run at me, or throw acid bombs at me? I couldn’t predict it. Mind you, this is more of a criticism of my own skill, not the game.

Overall, I saw them as an exciting challenge. They were never so difficult to get past that it ruined the fun, but still scary and worry-inducing when I saw one!

Did you like the more open-ended area in Seattle? 

LeBlanc: Yes, I actually did really enjoy this area of the game, and I say it this way because normally I am not a fan of open-world games in general. This is because I am easily overwhelmed, and my ADHD brain has a hard time figuring out what I should do next, what mission is more important, etc. But because this was at least a little bit contained and had a map to follow for guidance if you wanted it, my issues with open-world spaces didn’t really apply here. I also love crossing anything off of a list, so being able to visit a certain building and then watch Ellie cross that place off on the map was very satisfying.

I also really liked this area because I am a super-searcher when it comes to collecting items, ammo, etc. I want to scour every last corner for anything that can help me. Again, I am a very amateur player, so I want all the help I can get! So having the open world area was fun and exciting because I knew that I was going to be super stocked up on what I needed, which makes me feel a lot more confident moving forward. It was also really interesting to go into all these little shops and peer into the pre-Cordyceps world of the game and find collectibles, notes, posters, and more detailing what this place was like before the fungus took over. 

The last of us part ii remastered impressions first-time player 2024 roguelike no return survival

How do you feel about Ellie’s lean into violence and torture to get what she needs? 

LeBlanc: I hated it…and I loved it. At first, I would be like, “Oh no, Ellie, what are you doing? Don’t do this, this isn’t you!” And then I’d flip to, “Oh my gosh, she’s doing exactly what Joel would do if he were in her position. She learned all of this from Joel,” and it only made me love watching it play out. Seeing so much of Joel’s characteristics and actions reflect back onto Ellie only made me feel for Ellie more and how big this loss really was for her. So yeah, definitely hard to watch but also endearing in a weird way.

How did you feel about Ellie making it to the aquarium – specifically, killing Alice the dog, Mel, and Owen? 

LeBlanc: I mean, watching it play out from Ellie’s end, it was clear to me that she was doing what she felt like she had to do to get answers and find Abby. It was definitely rough watching it because it’s not like she is doing this to save someone she loves – she’s doing this to get revenge. I think it’s easy to watch someone do these things knowing they have someone’s life on the line that they love and are trying to save, but at this point, she’s doing this to further her mission of vengeance, so it’s hard to empathize with her actions. But, it’s clear she is starting to feel a little bit of that when she realizes after the fact that Mel was pregnant. It was tough to watch.

The last of us part ii remastered impressions first-time player 2024 roguelike no return survival

What did you think of the mid-game cliffhanger? 

LeBlanc: Oh my gosh, I was like, “How are people expected to not just play through this game in one sitting?” I was dying to know what happened. Not only that, but I knew I was nowhere near the end of the game, so I thought, “Where in the world are we going to go from here?”

What did you think of the switch to Abby’s perspective immediately after? 

LeBlanc: I was at first like, “Oh my god, you have got to be kidding me, it’s going to take me forever to get to that cliffhanger moment and find out what happens.” But once I settled in, I enjoyed playing as Abby and learning her background, as well as what the WLF really was and how their operation worked. 

Whose half did you like more – Ellie or Abby? 

LeBlanc: I’m scared to answer this question because it might be an unpopular opinion to go against our beloved protagonist, but I think I enjoyed playing as Abby more. Her parts of the game were more fun to play out, and she faced more challenges than Ellie did, between the Seraphites, journeying through the hotel, and the hospital scene. 

The last of us part ii remastered impressions first-time player 2024 roguelike no return survival

Tell me your thoughts about Abby’s journey with Lev?

LeBlanc: Well, besides having a badass little bow-and-arrow-wielding friend to sneak around and kill enemies with me so I wasn’t alone, which in itself was awesome and very helpful, their journey showed a very compassionate side of Abby. It showed that she’s a human and, in my opinion, overall, a good person. Right off the bat, it’s easy to paint these characters as good or bad at face value, but that’s part of what makes these games so good, is showing that you can be a good person and make bad decisions, and vice-versa. Abby made a bad-guy decision killing Joel, but a good-guy decision helping Yara and Lev when she really didn’t need to, especially going back to check on them.

What do you think of Lev and his story? 

LeBlanc: Lev’s story is an important one, showing that these issues of judgment towards trans people don’t go away, even in the face of a major epidemic. There are literal fungus zombies walking around, and these crazy people are still more worried about whether a person is a boy or a girl. I loved that Lev ended up trusting Abby enough to really divulge what happened to him, why he shaved his head, why he and Yara ran away, and later the complicated feelings driving him to run back to his mother and the Seraphites. His journey added an interesting element to the story and showed that trans people exist and will continue to exist even in the face of major adversity, and he’s a very strong character for that.

The last of us part ii remastered impressions first-time player 2024 roguelike no return survival

You thought the game was over when controlling Ellie at the farmhouse. How did the epilogue of the game hit you? 

LeBlanc: I really did think the game was over! I was like, “Oh my gosh, I did it, this is so beautiful, wow!” And then, when Ellie makes it clear she’s going back out there to find Abby, it was so hard to keep playing because I wanted her to accept her new beautiful life so badly. She got the sheep farm that Joel had wanted. She had a beautiful family. I hated that I had to keep moving her through the story and make her leave something that was so good. 

With the entire game behind you, how do you feel about the pacing of the game, especially compared to the first one? 

LeBlanc: As far as pacing goes, I think overall, it was pretty well done. Both halves of Ellie and Abby’s days in Seattle were pretty even. The only thing that was a little rushed was the Rattlers storyline. That group just wasn’t really developed compared to the Fireflies, WLF, or the Seraphites. But at the same time, had it been as developed as the other groups, the ending of the game might have been a little too long, so I understand their decision to write it this way.

Tell me your thoughts about that ending!

LeBlanc: I was in absolute anguish fighting Abby. She was already barely alive when Ellie cut her down from that stake. It felt so low to keep attacking her. I love Ellie as a character, flaws and all, but I wanted her to stop so badly, to not be this person who needs revenge so desperately that she can’t see that she’s already gotten it. 

Overall, what do you think of The Last of Us Part II?

LeBlanc: I absolutely loved it. I loved playing as Abby, and I loved playing as Ellie. I loved watching Ellie and Joel’s reconciliation at the end, knowing that at the time of his death, they were working on being friends again, thus ripping my heart out further. In fact, I loved having my heart ripped out. I wish I could do it again. That’s how you know it’s a good story! 

Do you want a third game? What do you envision it being? 

LeBlanc: Selfishly, yes, I would love a third game simply because I genuinely enjoyed playing this game so much. But realistically, I don’t know if a third game could complement the story to make it better. The ending is so perfect the way it is, I would be scared to ruin such a good thing. 

How do you think HBO will adapt Part II as a TV series? 

LeBlanc: I hope HBO splits it up the exact same way the game does. I hope we have Ellie’s three days in Seattle, then Abby’s three days in Seattle, and then the aftermath. If that makes it so that Part II has to be split up into multiple seasons to tell the story effectively, then so be it – I accept that. In case anyone at HBO is out there reading this one person’s very amateur opinion, and you’re worried there isn’t an audience here for that, you’re wrong! I’m here! I’m here for it! 

Anything else you want to mention that I didn’t ask about? 

LeBlanc: As someone who is fairly new to these kinds of games, playing The Last of Us has made me even more excited to start playing other games like it. I used to be just an Animal Crossing and Super Mario player, and that’s pretty much where it ended. But I love reading, movies, and TV series because I love a good story, and I’m so glad that you convinced me to give these two games a shot for the sake of the story. It’s opened up a whole new world for me in the way of games, and I can’t wait to get started on playing more games like this. But I gotta say, after playing and loving TLOU Parts I and II, these other games have some very serious competition.

For more, read Game Informer’s original review of The Last of Us Part II and then check out this NGT of The Last of Us Part II Remastered’s No Return roguelite. 

3 Questions: Implementing the MIT Graduate Student Union’s collective bargaining agreement

3 Questions: Implementing the MIT Graduate Student Union’s collective bargaining agreement

When eligible MIT graduate students voted to be represented by a union in April 2022, the decision set in motion significant changes in the graduate student ecosystem at the Institute. Moving forward, graduate students in the Graduate Student Union (GSU)’s bargaining unit — about 3,500 research assistants, teaching assistants, and instructors-G — will be represented by the GSU and covered by the terms of a collective bargaining agreement (CBA). MIT negotiated with the GSU throughout the 2022-23 academic year, ultimately reaching a CBA that was ratified by a union vote on Sept. 23, 2023. Vice Chancellor for Undergraduate and Graduate Education Ian A. Waitz, who helped lead the negotiation process, explains the nuts and bolts of the CBA, how it will be implemented, and other graduate student support measures that are underway.

Q: What are the highlights of the CBA reached between MIT and the Graduate Student Union?

A: First of all, it’s important to note that the CBA covers the terms and conditions of employment for anyone in the bargaining unit — all grad student RAs, TAs, and instructor-Gs (which are graduate students with considerable teaching experience) — whether or not they have elected to join the union and become union members. There are a number of economic provisions and benefits in the agreement, including salary increases of 5.4 percent, 3.5 percent, and 3.25 percent over the three years of the contract; an 83.3 percent subsidy of the individual dental care premium and an increased MBTA subsidy; and grants to defray expenses that certain groups of graduate students have, such as international students and students with families. The Office of Graduate Education (OGE) created a grad student benefits table that spells out further details.

We also reached agreement on non-economic provisions, such as the grievance and arbitration process and a no-strike clause. Finally, we agreed that the GSU would be an “agency shop,” which means that all RAs, TAs, and instructor-Gs are required to pay 1.44 percent of their RA, TA, or instructor-G wages to the union as a condition of their employment, whether or not they choose to be a member of the union. I provided more information about this contractual provision in an email I sent to all graduate students.

Again, these are just a few highlights. There are many other issues we agreed upon during the yearlong negotiation process, so I would encourage anyone who is interested to take a look at the Collective Bargaining Agreement [Touchstone authentication required]. As for students who are not in the bargaining unit, such as those on fellowships, we are committed to ensuring a level of equity regarding stipends and various benefits, and we want to make sure they understand all the ways they are supported. The benefits table has more information about benefits available to students on certain fellowships.

Q: What does implementation of the CBA entail, and how is it progressing?

A: Well, not surprisingly, implementation is complex. The CBA represents about 60 pages of contractual commitments that came into effect all at once. Some changes that we are making may seem relatively straightforward, like issuing bargaining unit members retroactive 5.4 percent salary increases. But even that involved 5,000 different appointments, many with unique characteristics. And for the sake of equity, MIT also raised the stipends of most students who are on fellowships, and therefore are not part of the bargaining unit, by 0.15 percent, to bring their AY [academic year]-23-24 stipend increase to 5.4 percent as well. There are several other new benefits — MBTA passes, the new dental insurance subsidy, parking — that also require new policies, procedures, and systems.

Other issues we need to address are organizationally complicated in that they involve all supervisors and administrators of graduate student employees, as well as the graduate student employees themselves. One example is how we manage graduate student appointments. Before the CBA was ratified, our system was very simple: Faculty and staff who supervise graduate students would notify their departments about the appointment and funding source. Now we need to process appointments sooner, and faculty and staff supervisors need to provide many more details about the appointment, such as hours students are required to work and the duties they are expected to perform.

Moreover, we need to efficiently document changes in a student’s appointment status, because their status may impact whether or not they are in the bargaining unit. For example, a student might be on an RA one semester, and then the next semester they might be on a fellowship, and are therefore not in the bargaining unit. This all needs to be tracked carefully and in a timely way.

Yet another change is that we are now required to formally review and act on a dozen different kinds of leaves. And students in the bargaining unit are required to formally submit requests for most types of leave. Some of these are handled centrally, some (like vacation) are handled by the individual graduate employee supervisor. Students on fellowships will continue to arrange for flexibility/time away from their academic requirements as they always have, by working with their advisor or with their department and GradSupport as appropriate for longer times away.

We will also have new requirements for formal review and approval of outside professional activities that graduate student workers may wish to pursue.

In order to address many of these new procedures, IS&T [Information Systems and Technology] and the broader MIT CBA implementation team have launched a new system comprising a student appointment portal, a supervisor portal, and an administrator portal.

In addition, those of us who supervise or work with graduate students will need to be clearer about our expectations for academic work. We’ve received a lot of questions from faculty about how the 20-hour workload for graduate students in the bargaining unit relates to academic requirements, like completing a thesis. To iron all of these issues out, the Committee on Graduate Programs (CGP) and OGE are developing policies for departments so that they can communicate their expectations. CGP and OGE will also be issuing guidance on the creation of a new graduate academic performance group, made up of students, staff, administrators, and faculty, to look at cases related to academic performance.

Needless to say, making these kinds of changes is a challenge for a decentralized institution like ours! But we are embracing it, because ultimately it will benefit all of our students and programs.  

Q: Besides the CBA, what other priorities is MIT working on to support graduate students?

A: One of the priorities that we have been focusing on for the past few years is graduate student professional development. The Graduate Student Professional Development Refinement and Implementation Committee, which was an outgrowth of Task Force 2021 and Beyond, has been meeting for over a year now and is working to design a professional development requirement for MIT PhDs. The committee, which is made up of faculty, administrators, and PhD students, has visited a number of departments, student groups, and co-curricular offices to ask for input and spark conversation about professional development at the graduate level. Some of the ideas they are currently exploring are ways in which PhD students might benefit from forming a committee of professional development mentors, and also how internships might be made available as a professional development activity to interested PhDs. 

In addition, Career Advising & Professional Development, in collaboration with partners, is just now unrolling two new professional development certificate programs on research mentoring and grant writing training. The Research Mentoring Training Certificate is a collaboration with the Engineering Communication Labs, and 245 PhDs and postdocs applied for this program. The Grant Writing Training Certificate Program, which is a collaboration with the Office of the Vice President for Research, was also received well, seeing 325 applications for the 100 available places. It’s exciting to see this ongoing improvement in MIT’s professional development programming taking shape.

Ultimately, our goal to enhance the life and learning experience for graduate students has remained a north star. MIT has been and remains one of the best places in the world to pursue an advanced degree in everything from philosophy to urban studies to mechanical engineering. While unionization is changing how we manage our graduate teaching and research enterprise in some fundamental ways, we are embracing it with a spirit of opportunity. We are particularly grateful for all of our campus partners, especially our graduate administrators, instructors and faculty, and other staff, who are working with us to adapt and respond to all that we need to do with such grace.

Persona 3 Reload Preview – A Final Hands-On Session – Game Informer

Ever since I got my hands on Persona 3 Reload over the summer, I’ve described it to folks as “Persona 3 redone in the form of Persona 5 Royal.” While that may be a gross oversimplification, it’s also pretty high praise. Longtime fans of the Persona series point towards Persona 3 as the entry that changed the course of the series, pointing it down the path it’s been on for nearly the last two decades. While Persona 3 may be the most important entry from a mechanical perspective, Persona 5 has the most mainstream relevance, particularly in 2024.

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The mainline Persona series has since made the leap from being largely a PlayStation franchise to finding a home on multiple platforms, with Persona 3 Portable, Persona 4 Golden, and Persona 5 Royal available now on PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo consoles. That opened the series to massive new audiences, but though the newer Persona 4 Golden still feels remarkably playable by modern standards, Persona 3 Portable – by far, the oldest of the trio – sticks out like a sore thumb amidst that collection of classic RPGs as having aged the worst.

Persona 3 Reload Preview – A Final Hands-On Session – Game Informer

While Persona 3 Portable is the PSP version of the title, even the other versions of the influential RPG would feel outdated in several ways by today’s standards. “[Persona 3] came out 18 years ago; a lot has changed in 18 years in terms of how you make a game and how you make a game entertaining and increase its usability,” Persona 3 Reload producer Ryota Niitsuma says. “Obviously, we’ve learned a lot over the years from making our other games; we picked up a lot of know-how and information on how to make a game more entertaining to play. We put all of that, without hesitation, into the game.”

“Persona 3 Reload is a title that takes all of the elements and things we’ve learned from [Persona 4] Golden and onwards and puts them into an accumulation of all of our knowledge to the title,” Persona 3 Reload director Takuya Yamaguchi adds. “I think in terms of playability and fun, this is a great place to get into the series.”

Persona 3 Reload

Fans made it known that a remake was highly sought after, and when the team wrapped up work on Persona 5 Royal, it heard these requests from players and decided it would be the studio’s next project. It quickly began discussing what approach it should take. “There were people that said we should just make a one-to-one remake and there were some people who said we should make big changes and kind of redo everything,” Yamaguchi says. “After a lot of discussion, we decided to mainly go with a one-to-one approach to recreate the original game. However, that’s for the major core of what makes the game it, and for small kinds of changes and powering the game up for a modern audience, that’s what we decided to focus our efforts on for the remake.”

While those changes were necessary to make to appeal to modern players, Atlus took great care not to disrupt the core tenets of the game, characters, and story. The focus on death, grief, and contemplating how to proceed with your remaining time continues to permeate this remade experience. 

Hands-On

Persona 3 Reload

While my previous demo was a more guided tour of the game, with a section dedicated to exploring Tartarus followed by a section devoted to a boss battle, this final hands-on session feels more organic. I’m dropped into the game in the month of June and can choose what activities I want to pursue outside of one day when I’m required to go into Tartarus.

I spend my first day exploring two new social link activities, one with Junpei and one with Akihiko. First up, during the After School timeframe, Junpei asks if we could go to the arcade. While there, he talks about how he thinks we could learn some moves from some of the fighting games there, and then challenges me to a competitive game. Following some friendly banter, I raise the level of his Hermes Persona.

Persona 3 Reload

After parting ways with Junpei, I see a text from Akihiko, who asks me to go with him to get some food. Unfortunately, we’re interrupted by a group of girls who view him as a celebrity thanks to his boxing win streak. He turns them down and we continue our walk. We walk a bit more but stumble upon that same group of girls cornered by a group of guys. They’re aggressively hitting on the girls, but it’s clear the girls just want to leave. Akihiko intervenes, allowing the girls to run while he confronts the guys. Just as a fight is about to break out, the police arrive. In this interaction, we learn that there’s been gang activity in the area recently and to be careful with whom you start trouble. Akihiko and I jog back, increasing my max HP.

As my character lays in bed after the eventful evening, he’s visited by the Mysterious Boy. After a brief conversation, I form a bond with him and his Death Arcana. Then next day, I walk home with Chihiro, forming a bond with the Justice Arcana. However, the most monumental sequence of the day occurs in the evening, as Ikutsuki calls a meeting with the team.

Persona 3 Reload

In this meeting, Ikutsuki provides special SEES equipment that allows the use of Theurgy, a new combat ability in Persona 3 Reload. Using characters’ emotions, you can unleash super strong powers. The team enters Tartarus to test out the new equipment. After Fuuka scouts for a good floor to enter, she mentions it feels distorted for some reason. Still, we go in and proceed with the test. 

The turn-based combat present in the series feels as good as ever. Taking on Shadows, exploiting weaknesses to earn 1 More attacks, and then executing an All-Out Attack always delivers a strong sense of satisfaction. But once I complete the floor, I finally get a chance to see Theurgies in action. Each character has a Theurgy gauge. Once that gauge is charged, you can unleash a powerful attack that doesn’t cost HP or SP, and it often ignores resistances.

Persona 3 Reload

Each character charges thanks to different actions, while each character’s Theurgy move does different actions. For example, Yukari’s Theurgy meter charges when she heals herself or her teammate, and her Theurgy attack deals severe wind damage that ignores resistance. Other characters charge their meters differently like Junpei landing critical hits or the protagonist summoning his Persona. Or, as Junpei puts it, “If we’re fired up enough, we can really pop off!” You have to be careful, though, as the gauge stops increasing when you have a status ailment, and it drops by half when that character is KO’d.

I love how this meter encouraged me to perform different actions with each character, giving combat a fresher, more varied feeling. “For me, this fits the Persona 3 Reload vibe very well and also updates the battle system of the game,” Yamaguchi says. “We had the 1 More! system, but this is a really new evolution of that which I think works really well.”

I spend much of the rest of my hands-on session exploring social links, including shopping with Kenji, training on the track team with Kazushi, and walking home with track team manager Yuko. If you’ve played a Persona game, you have a great idea of what to expect as these social links continue to deepen, and I can’t wait to continue exploring these relationships further in the full game. I also spend a little bit of time in school, including answering a question to improve my Charm rating and studying to improve my Academics rating.

Persona 3 Reload

Before wrapping up my demo, I spend a bit more time exploring Tartarus. After fighting several Shadows, including a Rare Shadow, I learn about Fuuka’s Oracle Theurgy, which can analyze the entire battlefield, apply status ailments to enemies, or buff the entire team. I bet that’ll come in handy for boss battles, but in this scenario against standard Shadows, they don’t stand a chance. After continuing for a few more floors, I find a Valuable Treasure Chest, which holds a Dekunda Gem, and my demo ends.

After relinquishing my controller, I couldn’t wait to start the adventure earnestly. I love the updates made to this version of Persona 3, and it truly feels like it could replace Persona 5 Royal as the best jumping-on-point for the amazing role-playing series. Persona 3 Reload arrives on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC on February 2.

How to rebuild trust after a cyber security breach – CyberTalk

How to rebuild trust after a cyber security breach – CyberTalk

By Rupal Hollenbeck, President, Check Point

  • With cyber attacks rising and trust in institutions declining, having a cyber security resilience plan is essential for business
  • Consolidating fragmented cyber security systems is the key preventative strategy
  • Strong communications with customers is equally important in the aftermath to re-establish trust

The last several years have fundamentally changed the way we live and work. The shift to remote and hybrid work has produced significant disruption, which in turn has led to technology innovation. This enabled people to connect to their workplaces and stay productive from outside the traditional security perimeter through new platform tools, workforce collaboration solutions, internal messaging integrations, remote training and more.

At the height of this innovation, however, collective trust in institutions experienced decline. In 2019, approximately 64% of respondents indicated a degree of trust in big business, according to Gallup. By 2023, that had declined by eight percentage points, while the share of people expressing very little or no trust at all in big business jumped seven percentage points to 43%.

Rebuilding trust has been a priority for companies everywhere, but there are notable headwinds slowing this process down. Unfortunately, we get news of security breaches at major institutions with alarming regularity. It’s no wonder that in this threat environment, businesses are struggling to rebuild trust with their customers. Naturally, this involves establishing a strong, proactive and preventative cyber security posture. It also means developing a resilience plan for when a cyber security incident occurs to limit the impact from a technical, organizational and financial point of view.

Before it happens

The first and most important element is to focus on prevention. Consolidation is the best way to achieve this. Industry did well to produce the innovation the market needed to facilitate the first phase of the rapid transition to cloud, but we’ve matured past these products’ ability to provide comprehensive protection. Most companies have adopted a host of point products to execute different kinds of business. This has produced sprawling, inadequately secured networks. It’s a patchwork system, and organizations, as a result, end up with patchwork coverage incapable of evolving with the company, all while paying a premium by dealing with multiple vendors. And threat actors have taken notice. The number of data breaches experienced in private industry has more than doubled since 2019, according to Verizon’s Data Breach Incident Report.

Executives understand this: Research from Gartner shows 75% of organizations are consolidating security vendors, up from 29% in 2020. Secure access service edge (SASE) and extended detection and response (XDR) technologies are a good starting point for the consolidation journey, as these solutions secure access for distributed users and enable teams to detect and respond to threats, respectively. Most importantly, these solutions are designed not only to respond to threats, but identify and prevent them from turning into breaches. When deployed in a consolidated platform with complete interoperability with the rest of the security suite, they offer greater visibility and security by transforming the toolset into a proactive, prevention-oriented program, limiting the potential fallout from a breach before it even happens. When a security incident does occur, customers can be confident that the systems are in place to limit how much damage an intruder can do, which in turn lays a foundation to rebuild trust for the future.

When it happens

While a strong security posture can prevent the worst outcomes, threat actors only need to get lucky once. No organization is completely immune to breach. The damage from these incidents can range from monetary damages to broad loss of confidence in the company’s ability to do business safely. How does a company rebuild trust after this kind of unauthorized access?

First, you need to limit the damage. That’s why the first step to rebuilding trust is a proactive one: Build a consolidated, prevention-focused security posture, and you’ll be able to limit the fallout. If you’re unable to do so before an incident, it should be the first objective after restoring business operations. Customers will need to know that prevention is your first priority.

The key to rebuilding trust over time is to communicate. The company must demonstrate that they are acting according to a cohesive strategy. This will always include appropriate disclosures. Prompt and transparent disclosure of a breach is important, and most jurisdictions require one to be made “without unreasonable delay”, so there’s a compliance element to this. Beyond that, it enables the appropriate parties to take action to protect themselves or even help develop a fix.

Special communications should go to customers. If continuity of operations has been interrupted, provide a timeline that the company can stick to, if possible. Alert customers to their own potential exposure, and provide the tools to remediate as soon as they’re available.

Your external communications – whether that’s in the press, social media or on the company blog – must be informational, action-oriented and clear about the scope of the damage. Most importantly, these communications must highlight what the company has done to address the breach, how this fits into a broader strategy, and why a similar incident won’t compromise them in the future. Avoid taking a defensive posture, and instead approach the situation as partners.

Essentially, responding to a breach is about people, process and technology in that order. Make sure the people impacted are in the loop with consistent and clear communications first and foremost. Identify and fix process and technology failures during remediation.

Confidence is key for cyber security

Ultimately, there is no replacement in modern business for building a prevention-focused cyber security posture. A company that fails to prioritize cyber security is a soft target for threat actors of all stripes. Trust requires confidence that your partner is acting to protect your mutual interests, and that means investing in consolidated cyber security that evolves along with your business and, crucially, the threat environment.

Be prompt and transparent in your disclosures and communications – delays expand the window for additional damage and obfuscation degrades customer and public trust in the statements you do make. You must give customers and the public good reasons to trust you. Building trust takes time, and there’s no substitute for a track record. As a result, strong, consolidated cyber security is already serving as a differentiator.

This article was originally published by the World Economic Forum and has been reprinted with permission.