The European Union’s Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) is designed to ensure the cybersecurity of products with digital elements across the entire EU market. With a compliance deadline set for mid-2026, businesses across industries are now facing the urgent task of aligning their products and processes with these new, stringent requirements. 

Achieving CRA compliance is not just a regulatory checkbox. It’s essential for avoiding heavy fines, reducing legal liability, maintaining access to the lucrative EU market, and safeguarding competitive advantage in an increasingly security-conscious world. 

Yet, for many businesses, the road to compliance can seem daunting and costly. Implementing the required technical measures, adapting internal processes, and managing supply chain security all pose real challenges, especially for organizations that are unfamiliar with cybersecurity best practices. 

The good news: by adopting a secure by design approach and integrating regular penetration testing (pentesting) into your development and maintenance cycles, you can dramatically simplify CRA compliance. These proactive strategies not only meet regulatory demands but also build long-term resilience, trust, and business value. 

EU Cyber Resilience Act in a Nutshell 

As a landmark regulation, the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) sets out to heighten the cybersecurity of products with digital elements (both hardware and software) across the European market. It applies to the entire product lifecycle, from the early stages of design and development through to deployment, sales, and post-market support. Central to the CRA is the principle of secure by design, requiring manufacturers to integrate cybersecurity measures into their products from the outset rather than as an afterthought. 

By harmonizing cybersecurity standards across the EU single market, the CRA aims to create a level playing field for businesses and enhance consumer trust. Its scope is broad, covering everything from consumer electronics and Internet of Things (IoT) devices to software applications and industrial control systems. Concretely, all digital products placed on the EU market must meet essential cybersecurity requirements, pass conformity assessments, and offer ongoing security updates and support throughout their lifecycle. 

The CRA was officially adopted in 2024, and reporting requirements will become applicable in September 2026, with all requirements taking effect in December 2027 – a timeline that leaves little room for delay in preparing and adapting to the new requirements.  

Challenges Businesses Face in Achieving CRA Compliance 

While the goals of the Cyber Resilience Act are clear, many businesses feel overwhelmed, standing in front of significant challenges. Legacy systems pose one of the biggest hurdles, as older products and infrastructures were rarely built with secure by design principles in mind and often require extensive redesign or even replacement. Companies without embedded cybersecurity practices must rethink their architectures, which can be both technically demanding and costly. 

Adding to the pressure, the CRA requires not just one-time fixes but ongoing risk management, including regular security updates and vulnerability handling. This demands skilled cybersecurity talent, a resource already in short supply, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Moreover, navigating complex conformity assessments, some requiring third-party certification, introduces additional administrative and financial burdens. Ensuring that third-party vendors and supply chain components are also compliant further complicates the task. 

Many business leaders fear that pursuing compliance will slow down innovation, complicate internal processes, and drive up costs. However, the risks of non-compliance are far greater: companies face potential fines of up to €15 million or 2.5 % of global annual turnover, possible bans from the EU market, and severe reputational damage if found lacking. Beyond financial penalties, non-compliance can result in operational disruption, loss of customer trust, and a weakened competitive position – all underscoring the urgent need for proactive action. 

How Secure by Design and Pentesting Simplify CRA Compliance 

For businesses looking to navigate CRA compliance effectively, adopting a secure by design approach is one of the most powerful strategies. By embedding cybersecurity requirements, such as access control, data protection, and secure communication, directly into the development process, companies create built-in compliance rather than scrambling to apply fixes later. This shift-left security approach not only avoids costly redesigns but also streamlines documentation and technical file creation, a key part of CRA obligations. 

To learn more about how to successfully implement the shift-left approach in your organization, check out our in-depth article here. 

Secure by design practices also help businesses manage supply chain risks, as they promote secure procurement and careful vetting of third-party components. More importantly, they establish a foundation for continuous risk management, ensuring security updates, patching, and monitoring are part of daily operations. Internally, this fosters better collaboration between engineering, legal, and compliance teams, creating stronger and more resilient organizational processes. 

Complementing this, regular penetration testing (pentesting) plays a critical role in achieving and maintaining CRA compliance. Pentesting allows businesses to validate their security controls, ensuring they meet CRA standards in practice, not just on paper. It helps uncover vulnerabilities early, reducing both risk and cost, and offers tangible evidence of due diligence to regulators, partners, and customers. Beyond compliance, pentesting feeds into continuous improvement cycles, reduces the chance of public breaches or fines, and makes incident reporting more precise and efficient thus turning security from a defensive necessity into a competitive business advantage. 

Turning CRA Compliance Into a Business Advantage 

In summary, the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) introduces a pivotal shift in how businesses must approach cybersecurity – not as an afterthought, but as an integral part of product development, delivery, and ongoing support. While achieving compliance may seem challenging, adopting secure by design principles and integrating regular pentesting make the path clearer, smoother, and more cost-effective. 

Beyond simply meeting regulatory requirements, businesses that embrace these practices gain significant advantages: they shorten time to market by reducing last-minute security fixes, enhance customer trust by demonstrating a strong security posture, and future-proof their operations against upcoming regulations like NIS2 in Europe or IoT laws in the U.S.