What Are 10 Major Industry-Specific Cybersecurity Regulations?

Why Compliance Looks Different in 2025

Cybersecurity compliance is not a broad, one-size-fits-all exercise. In 2025, regulatory frameworks are tailored to sector-specific threats, data sensitivities, operational risks, and come with several updates. Governments and regulators have escalated enforcement by introducing targeted mandates and publicly naming noncompliant organizations.

Whether you operate in healthcare, finance, energy, education, or defense, aligning with the right cybersecurity regulations is now a strategic necessity for your business, not just checkboxes.

Healthcare: HIPAA and HITECH

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) governs the protection of protected health information (PHI) across healthcare entities to ensure integrity and confidentiality of health information. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act addresses breach notification and increasing penalties for noncompliance.

Covered entities and business associates must maintain:

• Administrative, physical, and technical safeguards
• Ongoing risk assessments and staff security training
• Regular reviews of effectiveness of security measures and risks to PHI
• Encryption of PHI at rest and in transit (not an explicit mandate as it is an “addressable implementation specification”)
• Breach notification within 60 days of discovery (this can vary based on number of individuals affected in the breach)

HHS published a notice of proposed rulemaking on the Security Rule, which could change the cybersecurity requirements for covered entities and which received over 4,000 comments in the comment period.

Financial Services: GLBA and DORA

In the United States, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) mandates that financial institutions protect consumer financial data and disclose how it’s shared. Organizations must:

• Have a cybersecurity program that protects consumer information
• Regular vendor cybersecurity assessments
• Develop an incident response plan

In the European Union, the Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA)—enforced as of 2025—requires banks, insurers, and other financial entities to perform risk assessments, report cyber incidents, and monitor third-party dependencies. In some cases under DORA, companies must report incidents within four hours.

Together, these frameworks strengthen cybersecurity regulations for financial entities and underscore the importance of data protection laws on both sides of the Atlantic.

Retail: PCI DSS Version 4.0

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) governs the handling of credit card information. Version 4.0, with a deadline for implementation in 2025, modernizes controls for merchants and third parties in retail or e-commerce.

Key changes include:

• Increased authentication standards
• Stronger password policies
• Increased accountability for third-party service providers

Retailers that fail to meet PCI DSS may lose payment processing capabilities, incur regulatory penalties, and suffer lasting brand damage.

Government Contractors: NIST 800-171 and CMMC 2.0

Organizations that store, transmit, or process Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) for U.S. federal agencies must adhere to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) 800-171. Organizations working for the Department of Defense should consider the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) 2.0 framework as well, which the DoD has updated in order to implement tiered cybersecurity standards for the defense industrial base (DIB).

Controls include:

• Access control mechanisms
• Audit logging and data integrity monitoring
• Defined incident response protocols
• Regular vulnerability scans and remediation cycles

CMMC Level 2 self assessments are operational as of February 2025 in the Supplier Performance Risk System, according to the DoD. Staying up-to-date on CMMC is crucial for defense contractors, since the DoD may implement higher levels of requirements in some procurements.

Critical Infrastructure: NERC CIP and TSA Directives

Entities in energy, transportation, and water management must comply with sector-specific cybersecurity regulations.

The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) standards apply for the Bulk Electric System.

The Transportation Security Administration enforces cybersecurity directives for pipeline operators, railways, and the aviation sector.

Common obligations include:

• Asset inventories
• Access management controls and monitoring
• Reporting security incidents in sometimes as little as 1 hour of discovery
• Maintaining incident response plans

These frameworks are central to protecting national resilience and reducing infrastructure risk under 2025 compliance rules.

Education: FERPA and EdTech Oversight

Violations of Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) occur when educational institutions fail to protect student records and personal information from unauthorized disclosure. With digital learning becoming standard, the plethora of EdTech vendors working with school networks makes compliance increasingly complex for schools.

Key areas of focus to avoid violations include but are not limited to strong cyber hygiene, best practices, and continuous monitoring:

• Secure authentication for student accounts
• Consent and transparency in third-party app usage
• Establishing and updating security standards with vendors
• Role-based access for teachers, administrators, and parents

How SecurityScorecard Supports Regulatory Readiness

SecurityScorecard helps organizations stay aligned with cybersecurity regulations by delivering:

• Continuous monitoring of third-party security posture
  
• Alerts on misconfigurations, certificate issues, and exposed access credentials
  
• Audit-ready evidence logs for regulatory reporting, board presentations, and compliance validation
  
• Reveal issues related to data protection mandates, such as GDPR, HIPAA, and NIST
  
• Supply Chain Detection and Response (SCDR) to identify and mitigate ecosystem-wide vulnerabilities before they become breaches

By automating visibility, mapping findings to security frameworks, and streamlining third-party oversight, SecurityScorecard reduces compliance fatigue and improves regulatory outcomes.

Compliance as a Continuous Process

In 2025, compliance is no longer a quarterly review for organizations—it must be a continuous practice. New and evolving sector-specific rules are redefining what secure operations look like. Organizations must adopt real-time visibility, maintain detailed audit trails, and verify third-party controls to remain compliant. With enforcement rising, cybersecurity regulations have become both a risk and an opportunity—and how companies respond will define their resilience.

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