CSO Online has recognized 64 security organizations with its annual CSO Awards for 2026, honoring projects that demonstrate exceptional security leadership and measurable business impact. The winning initiatives span multiple approaches to modern cybersecurity challenges, from zero trust architecture and AI automation to behavioral change management and cloud security transformation. These projects collectively illustrate how security teams are adapting to an increasingly complex threat environment while working within resource constraints.
Several winners focused on transforming security culture through innovative training methods. Copart, an online car auction company with 12,000 employees globally, revamped its security awareness program to make cybersecurity behavior as automatic as buckling a seatbelt. The company replaced manual, episodic training with an automated, adaptive program that delivers role-based phishing simulations and immediate micro-training. The new approach incorporated gamification with live leaderboards and achievements, plus automated reporting and executive scorecards. Results showed dramatic improvement, with phishing reporting rates jumping from 17-24% to 55-60%, and the program delivered 202,992 simulations in one year, including over 950 unique simulations tailored to employee roles and behaviors.
Other winners tackled technical security challenges through zero trust principles and automation. Hawaii Medical Service Association (HMSA) implemented a Zero Trust Data Governance Initiative to eliminate confidential member information from all nonproduction environments, addressing a common healthcare industry practice that significantly increases data privacy and cybersecurity risks. Using AI-enabled automated data masking technology from Perforce Delphix, HMSA successfully de-identified more than 50 terabytes of confidential data across heterogeneous platforms while maintaining operational continuity. Hensel Phelps Construction took a different approach, focusing on automation to build capacity within resource constraints. The five-person security team conducted dedicated "automation weeks" to systematically eliminate manual tasks, successfully automating over 1,250 hours of work annually through Project SAM (Security Automation Member).
Cloud security transformation also featured prominently among winners. K&N Engineering implemented a code-to-cloud security framework using Wiz technology after a cyber insurance assessment revealed vulnerabilities in their software deployment tools. The initiative integrated security into every stage of the development lifecycle across AWS and Azure environments, enabling the team to proactively identify and remediate vulnerabilities before deployment and continuously monitor production code. This shift-left strategy provided near real-time visibility into risk exposure while strengthening compliance. McDonald's also earned recognition for its "Securing the Arches" project, addressing the complex security challenges of operating 44,000 locations across 100 countries, with 95% run by local franchisees and a mobile app connecting 250 million consumers.
Security leaders should consider these award-winning approaches when planning their own initiatives. The projects demonstrate that measurable security improvements often require cultural change alongside technical implementation, whether through gamification, executive engagement, or team collaboration. Automation and zero trust principles emerged as common themes for scaling security operations without proportional headcount increases. Organizations facing similar challenges around security awareness, data governance, resource constraints, or cloud security can draw practical lessons from these implementations, particularly the emphasis on metrics, sustained executive support, and focusing automation efforts on high-impact manual tasks.
Source: https://www.csoonline.com/article/4168687/2026-cso-award-winners-showcase-business-enabling-cyber-innovation.html