Cybersecurity refers to practices designed to defend computers, mobile devices, electronic data storage platforms and networks against attacks such as ransomware extortion and data breaches.
Preventative techniques are key in mitigating cybersecurity risks and threats; however, with COVID-19 spreading rapidly and remote work increasing exponentially, there simply are not enough skilled cybersecurity professionals available.
Implementing Strong Access Controls
One of the key cybersecurity measures businesses must implement to safeguard themselves against cyber threats is implementing effective access controls. This should include authentication and authorization protocols that only authorized users have access to sensitive data – especially crucial when handling highly confidential materials such as trade secrets or customer data.
Once an attacker gains unauthorised access, they often move laterally across a network in search of valuable assets. Access control prevents this by restricting lateral movement across networks – effectively stopping attackers from being able to gain entry to all systems within an organization.
Technical access control measures include password management best practices, two-factor authentication, and firewalls. Furthermore, it’s vital that employees review and adjust their access levels as their job responsibilities shift over time.
Access control includes adhering to the principle of least privilege, which stipulates that employees should only receive permission necessary to fulfill their responsibilities and reduce security risks from unauthorized access or privilege escalation. It’s also beneficial to implement an automated access control solution that streamlines user provisioning and monitoring.
Regular Security Audits and Assessments
Cybersecurity measures such as access controls, data encryption methods and backups help safeguard sensitive information from unintended access. They play an integral part in maintaining the integrity of your company’s systems and avoiding data breaches that could cost your business both in terms of fines and business opportunities.
Regular security audits and assessments can also help identify vulnerabilities that hackers could exploit, such as configuration audits, penetration tests and vulnerability scans.
These assessments help your organization identify what risks it faces and prioritize them according to likelihood and consequences. Furthermore, these evaluations allow for the development of strategies and controls designed to mitigate such threats.
Risk assessments often suggest updating to more modern software as older systems tend to contain known vulnerabilities that hackers can easily find and exploit. They may also suggest using automated monitoring tools that detect anomalies or potential security incidents quickly.
Employee Training and Awareness Programs
Major cybersecurity breach that compromises and steals personal data of hundreds of thousands or even millions of individuals, yet cannot be stopped through employee training and awareness programs. While cyberattacks cannot always be avoided, risks may be reduced through employee education programs.
Many cyber attacks result from human error, so one effective way of protecting against this threat is through cybersecurity training. Employees can learn about common threats such as phishing scams as well as what not to do on work computers (using VPNs for instance and reducing digital footprint when working remotely).
Training materials and courses that are easy for employees to comprehend must be regularly revised, while attack simulations such as phishing tests should also be employed in order to ascertain whether they understand and can avoid cyber threats effectively. Doing this makes measuring success simpler while helping shape future training efforts accordingly.
Data Encryption and Protection
Encrypting that data ensures that, even if its storage medium were compromised, attackers wouldn’t be able to interpret its contents – an ideal data-at-rest protection method is symmetric encryption with only one key required for decryption.
Any time information is being transmitted across networks or between employees’ laptops, it must be encrypted in order to remain safe from being intercepted or altered in transit and also help protect sensitive data that could otherwise be intercepted or misused. Encryption serves two important functions – keeping interceptors away while protecting privacy of sensitive information.
Remembering that encryption isn’t failsafe can be daunting, and malicious actors are continually devising techniques to breach it. Phishing attacks or social engineering methods could allow an attacker access to decryption keys; while other can exploit weaknesses in cipher designs or side-channel attacks. Therefore, using current protection tools with strong key management systems is vital to ensure an encrypted environment remains safe from attack.
Network Security Measures
Network security strategies are vital in protecting businesses against cyberattacks. Utilizing multiple measures, this multidimensional approach guards against unauthorized access, threats and breaches against the data stored on IT systems by safeguarding against threats through various software solutions, devices and hardware solutions.
Firewalls: Acting as gatekeepers to networks, firewalls can identify and block unauthorized traffic while permitting authorized traffic through. Furthermore, firewalls monitor for suspicious activities that could disrupt network performance by sending alerts when any anomalous behavior is identified.
Antivirus and antimalware: These software solutions use antivirus scanning technologies to identify and eliminate threats such as viruses, ransomware, trojans, spyware, worms and rootkits from infiltrating a system or network. Furthermore, they can prevent them from invading further by blocking their entryway into it.
Behavioral analytics: This technique utilizes network behavior monitoring and automatically recognizes patterns that appear unusual, thus alerting teams of any potential risks or attacks in progress. Furthermore, behavioral analytics can quickly provide necessary information needed for swift responses against attacks in progress.
Data protection solutions convert readable data into coded format that can only be accessed with a specific key, ensuring privacy and security even in case of data breach. Businesses dealing with personal identifiable information (PII) or sensitive data should consider investing in these technologies to safeguard sensitive information.
Incident Response Planning
As it’s impossible to prevent every cyberattack, businesses must devise an effective response. This includes creating a communication strategy to inform stakeholders, investors, customers and the public of any breaches as they occur; creating backup solutions and outlining system recovery procedures when such incidents arise; as well as planning their responses before an incident has even taken place.
This plan should include six phases: Governance, Identification, Protection, Respond, Recovery and Learning. Govern and Identification phases should help prepare an organization against attacks by discovering vulnerabilities, managing risk tolerance levels and reducing risks; while Respond attempts to minimize damage caused by attacks by mitigating threats quickly while returning systems back into production as quickly as possible; finally Recover documents incidents while conducting analysis to strengthen defenses through lessons learned and improve the company’s defenses on an ongoing basis.
This should include continuous monitoring to detect vulnerabilities attackers seek to exploit, as well as employing kill switches that automatically shut down systems when threats are identified. It also involves developing an incident response team and communication plan in case of breaches; training employees how to withstand an attack.
Regular Software Updates and Patch Management
Most often major security risks emanate from external parties – be they maliciously (e.g. an employee turning against another vendor) or unwittingly (such as outdated software that allows hackers to easily gain access).
Patching systems regularly and fixing bugs in existing programs is one way to lower the risk of cyberattacks, making the overall software more stable and secure – helping support business operations.
Successful patch management processes involve all teams working collaboratively, with security and IT/DevOps teams understanding its significance and developing clear guidelines and assigning accountability in order to apply patches on time – which in turn reduces cyber risks while improving cybersecurity. For maximum success, using an advanced GRC platform such as ShareGRC helps security and IT teams easily share data, collaborate, and reduce risks while working within an ever-evolving threat landscape.
Backup and Disaster Recovery Planning
Data is an indispensable asset, so companies must safeguard it against potential threats in an ever-evolving digital landscape. From cyber attacks and natural disasters to human error, system failures, and other disasters – companies need an effective backup and recovery strategy in place in order to mitigate cybersecurity risk and ensure their data stays protected.
For a comprehensive DRP, conducting a rigorous risk analysis will be key. Once threats have been identified and assessed for likelihood and impact on the company, start conducting business impact analysis (BIAs) that rank each threat from 1-5 depending on its significance and potential outcomes.
This process should involve reviewing each department’s data and systems in order to assess what could occur if an incident were to strike, such as lost revenue and staffing costs; fiscal costs like fines for noncompliance; reputational damage etc; can help assess each risk’s impact. Once you know how much each risk could potentially cost the business, creating an action plan to counter its effects becomes simpler.