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Cybersecurity is a growing issue - as more and more data is created, it becomes less and less secure. This is why every October for National Cybersecurity Awareness Month (NCSAM), IT professionals across the world come together to help raise awareness of cybersecurity issues - and to educate employees to prevent these challenges as a result. Understanding the parameters and challenges With networks everywhere expanding, security risks are on the rise. Hubert da Costa, Senior Vice President and GM EMEA & APAC at Cybera points out: “The adoption of mobility, big data, social media, cloud and the Internet of Things is extending traditional enterprise perimeters, making them complex and difficult to secure. Distributed enterprises are especially vulnerable to intrusions and data breaches due to their remote locations lacking onsite IT and security staff to properly secure their networks. Far too often, application security is an afterthought if it is addressed at all. The solution is to embed security directly into the fabric of the network, striking a balance between user experience, security, and affordability. This approach combines defence-in-depth, micro-segmentation and continuous network monitoring.” “Almost all of the huge breaches we read about in the news involve attackers leveraging stolen user credentials to gain access to sensitive corporate data,” adds Steve Gailey, Head of Solutions Architecture at Exabeam. “This presents a significant problem for security teams. After all, an attacker with valid credentials looks just like a regular user. Identifying changes in the behaviour of these credentials is the key to successfully uncovering an attack. “But in an age of alert overload, security teams are often overwhelmed and can struggle to make sense of the data in front of them. Applying User and Entity Behaviour Analytics (UEBA) to the data already collected within most organisations can help security teams connect the dots and provide a useful profile of network user activity. It may not stop you being breached, but it will tell you about it before the damage is done.” A question of cloud “Public opinion on the cloud has come a long way in recent years, with most security professionals now accepting that it’s no less secure than the traditional, in-house way of doing things,” comments Michael Scheffler, AVP EMEA at Bitglass. “Allowing data to move beyond the traditional network perimeter can cause concern for many executives – if not properly secured, it can leave an enterprise vulnerable. “As adoption of cloud-based applications and services continues to grow throughout the business world, organisations need specialised security technology that is capable of protecting sensitive data wherever it is stored or accessed. The enterprise needs end-to-end security across all devices, locations, and users, as well as complete visibility throughout IT infrastructure. Fortunately, recent years have given rise to a variety of new security technologies that are designed to tackle the cloud’s unique challenges.” NCSAM is a time to pause and take stock of security practices, revising or enhancing to develop as robust a security posture as possible. Eltjo Hofstee, Managing Director at Leaseweb UK says, “as a cloud hosting provider to over 200 UK customers, Leaseweb constantly reviews its security checklist against the UK government’s 14 Cloud Security Principles to uphold compliance and best practice across all aspects related to security in the cloud.” Know the weakest link “Long gone are the days when all but the biggest data breaches would make the headlines of non-IT press,” comments Tim Bandos, Vice President of Cyber Security at Digital Guardian. “Today, it takes something huge to turn heads. Whether it’s 300,000 files and directories stolen by a former Tesla employee or the 600 million Facebook passwords ‘hidden’ in plain text, only these most egregious lapses in data security seem to set alarm bells ringing. “Data protection solutions can help prevent data loss, but maintaining a successful security program is largely dependent on employee awareness and their ability to comply. By teaching employees how to make decisions about the use and protection of data, they’re in a better position to make better judgments on their own around data in the future.” As Steve Wainwright, MD EMEA at Skillsoft explains, social engineering attacks are a go-to method for hackers: “They rely on unwitting, unsuspecting and, at times, careless employees. A recent PositiveTechnologies study found that more than one in ten employees fall for this type of attack. Social engineering attacks work by using information gained on social media or the dark web to build a profile of a person, and then pose as someone they might know via email. They will then encourage their victim to click on a link or download a file that contains malware. “The key to defending against this type of threat is education. By training employees to question and look out for suspicious emails, organisations can reduce the likelihood of successful attacks. Giving employees the skills and knowledge they need to identify potential attacks is the best way of mitigating the insider threat risk.” In this day and age, a cyber-attack is unfortunately more of an inevitability than just a mere threat. As a result of this Steve Nice, Chief Technologist at Node4 says, “businesses need to accept the fact that mitigation technology is a necessity. It’s important for organisations to recognise how to strengthen their security to prevent potentially devastating attacks from harming them. It’s the responsibility of the IT team to ensure that the business’s security is up to speed, and so a Vulnerability Testing programme can help the team understand where the weaknesses are and support these areas. This means that valuable time – and money – can be saved from being spent on unnecessary security infrastructures before knowing where the holes in the defence really lie. “However, it’s not just the technology that needs to be supported. Regardless of how many layers of protection IT teams implement, the weakest link is the people involved. Managing this is essential in any cyber security strategy, so it’s vital to ensure that all employees are fully up-to-date with the latest security protocols and processes in the company. This is a key part of cyber security, and even more so because the human element is the hardest to control and measure effectively.” Graham Marcroft, Compliance Director at Hyve Managed Hosting agrees: “The biggest threat and ‘weakest link’ when it comes to online security and data protection in the workplace is human error. This is often down to a lack of appropriate training and education for people who work in businesses that become victim to cyberattacks as a result. It is now more important than ever for businesses to make integrating cybersecurity a top priority for their employees by including it in their everyday working lives. “Forget dreary seminars and PowerPoint presentations: instead, give practical and accessible advice about how to recognise cyberattacks and prevent them. It’s high-time that businesses get more creative and think of ways to incentivise security awareness. This could be driven by fun competitions, ethical hacking initiatives or simply by focussing on the individual’s vital and ongoing role in cybersecurity.”
