Most organizations have a plan for responding to cyberattacks. But there is one thing that is often overlooked: how will people communicate if the tools they use every day are affected?
Email, collaboration platforms, and messaging apps are at the center of how we work. They help teams share information, make decisions, and coordinate responses when something goes wrong. But during a cyberattack or a service outage, those same tools may no longer be reliable.
If attackers gain access to internal systems, teams can quickly find themselves in a difficult position. Is email still safe to use? Can messages be trusted? Who can access the conversation?
What’s more, many everyday business tools like Teams and Slack are centralized SaaS services whose service availability is not under your control. If a glitch affects you, there’s a high chance that the problem affects the entire organization.
When uncertainty sets in, communication becomes just as important as the response itself.
The need for resilience is also gaining attention at the policy level. In its recent Preparedness Union Strategy, the European Commission called for stronger preparedness across the EU, encouraging governments, businesses, and citizens to be ready for disruptions ranging from cyberattacks to major crises. A key part of that preparedness is ensuring organizations can continue to operate and communicate when critical systems are under pressure.
Here's why out-of-band communications matter
Out-of-band communications provide a separate, secure channel that can be used when primary systems are unavailable, compromised, or simply not suitable for sensitive discussions.
This allows security teams, executives, and other key stakeholders to stay connected and make decisions with confidence.
Out-of-band is more than just "a different app." Depending on the mission-criticality of communications, the alternate channel should ideally have:
- A different infrastructure
- Different trust assumptions
- Independent authentication
- Reduced risk of being compromised by the same attack
A dedicated secure communications channel can help organizations:
- Coordinate incident response during a cyberattack
- Keep sensitive conversations protected with end-to-end encryption
- Continue operating when primary communication tools are unavailable
- Reduce the need to move discussions to consumer messaging apps
- Support business continuity during critical events
Security beyond incident response
The value of secure communications goes beyond cyberattacks.
Organizations regularly discuss sensitive topics, from strategic plans and acquisitions to security operations and critical infrastructure. Not every conversation should happen over the same platforms used for day-to-day collaboration.
Our SalaX Secure Messaging secure collaboration app was built for mission-critical organizations with these needs in mind.
Built on the Matrix protocol, SalaX Secure Messaging provides secure messaging, voice, and video communications while giving organizations control over their data and a variety of deployment options, including on-prem, private cloud, air-gapped and out-of-band. Teams can communicate securely across desktop and mobile devices without compromising usability.
For example, one emergency preparedness organization uses SalaX Secure Messaging as an air-gapped solution to support secure, data-sovereign collaboration across internal teams and external partners. The case shows how mission-critical organizations can keep sensitive communications under their own control while still enabling real-time collaboration when resilience and trust are essential.
Whether supporting incident response, enabling secure executive discussions, or helping organizations prepare for unexpected disruptions, SalaX Secure Messaging provides a trusted space for the conversations that matter most.
At the end of the day, teams need a way to communicate that they can trust, especially when everything else is under pressure.
