It seems like cybersecurity is on the mind of company decision makers even more than usual. In light of the headline news of large-scale cyber attacks on US government bodies, many companies are taking the opportunity to re-examine their cyber security strategies, with many finding gaps that could potentially be exploited. More companies are shifting to remote work, putting employees outside of company firewalls and creating new targets for hackers. So what’s the solution to the myriad of security problems the average mid-size company faces?
Multifaceted Solutions and Managed IT Security Services
However cyber security is handled at your company, now is likely the time to reach the next level of IT security. You can start by asking these questions of your company:
- What are the industry’s current best practices?
- Are your remote employees’ devices secure?
- What happens if their devices are lost or stolen?
IT security threats have always evolved rapidly, but today’s threats far outpace those of the past. Solutions that were cutting-edge 2 or 3 years ago may no longer be adequate. Forward-thinking solutions, tools, and practices with annual reviews for effectiveness offer the best path forward.
4 Key Recommendations to Improve Your Company’s Security Strategy
Though long-term security strategy is a complicated affair, there are some things you can do now to instantly reduce risk throughout your organization. In combination, these 4 recommendations go a long way in securing sensitive data and valuable IP.
1. Universal Endpoint Management
In our world of distributed, mobile employees, UEM is now a must for any well-managed IT environment. Universal Endpoint Management gives you detailed information on all user devices and allows you to manage them centrally. In one place, you can:
- Grant conditional access at a granular level
- Remote lock
- Remote wipe
- Separate personal data and corporate data
- Prevent sensitive data from leaving the device/network
- Push security patches
- Validate device encryption and backup
- Etc.
Any and all of these capabilities can help you demonstrate compliance, not mention give you peace of mind.
2. Enterprise Detection and Response (“The New Antivirus”)
A relatively new technology, Enterprise Detection and Response solutions integrate real-time intelligence from endpoints that enables a response to broad attack behaviors instead of dealing with them on an individual event-basis. In addition to significantly improving cyber attack response time and efficacy, these solutions often provide analytics to help identify root causes and expose vulnerabilities. Because this is a nascent technology, you should consider working with a dedicated IT security service provider for rollout and monitoring.
3. Single Sign-On with Multi-Factor Authentication (Identity and Access Management)
Employees today require access to dozens of company applications and systems, internal and cloud-based, that each require their own login and password. Unfortunately, this system is inherently insecure, not to mention a pain to manage. By integrating logins into a single secure system, you can:
- Reduce hassle for your employees
- Improve security across the enterprise
- Speed up onboarding and terminations
- Create a handy audit trail of access rights
Implementing SSO gets more difficult and expensive as you grow, so we recommend implementing it sooner rather than later.
4. Automated Security Awareness
All of our security technologies notwithstanding, human error is still a major driver of vulnerabilities. Though compliance regulations often require that we train employees on security awareness at least yearly, new inexpensive, automated systems are making this process simpler. Automated Security Awareness solutions train employees on the latest techniques used by hackers, and track their completion. Periodically, these solutions can even send test attacks to monitor users’ skills, revealing those within the organization in need of additional attention. Just knowing that tests will be coming heightens user awareness significantly, bringing security awareness to the forefront.
For more information on any of these solutions, our managed IT security services, or our rapid IT security audits, contact KalioTek at 408-550-8007 or sales@kaliotek.com.