Protect Data Differently for a Different World

**Executive summary:** This commentary urges organizations to adopt a military-style, data-centric cybersecurity approach—prioritizing least privilege, preventing third-party access to raw data, detecting and protecting sensitive data in real-time (leveraging AI), maintaining user productivity, and favoring fast, low-disruption deployments—and calls for board-level focus, tighter vendor/supply-chain controls, regulatory attention, and government action, while referencing recent high-impact incidents only as context rather than providing technical incident or forensic detail.