There have been some really great discussions this year on phishing emails and how adding email protection can really protect your employees from being hacked and then gain access to your data. Your business can also be vulnerable through your endpoints, this can include any laptops, desktops, mobile devices – which often get overlooked! Also, your server and of course cloud access. We are going to go over some ways to better protect those endpoints in your business today.
First do a walk through with your team to identify your business endpoints, prioritize your most important assets and have your IT team set up an asset management tool. Next you should be implementing proactive patch management, make use of tools that run regular scans and alert you of upcoming patches so your team can schedule those after hours so it does not affect daily business. Also check for Data Storage alerts and have your team regularly archive old emails that are not needed. If you use 0365, be aware of Deep nesting and how that might affect how quickly your data is used.
You will want to make sure MFA is enabled on all devices being used in your business. If you have a trusted administrator, make sure they have a separate email account to manage your 0365 to limit any access a hacker could gain to other users. Encourage the use of MFA with your team on all their devices including outside of the office for better protection. With office WIFI include a guest network for anyone outside the company and your staff to use during breaks. Discuss when it is acceptable to use their business email aka not for social logins or anything outside of work.
Include regular cyber coaching moments, show examples of phishing and smishing- text message phishing. Create a culture of safety and make it fun and valuable to create team engagement. Get them excited to share tech tips that they have learned about often with their peers. Lead from a top-down approach make sure management is on board and following the best practices they are sharing. This is a great time to connect on BYOD policy and get team buy in on new policies. Because there are more endpoints to protect it is important for your team to understand how this can affect business for everyone due to downtime or a financial redirection scam. A well-defined policy that everyone understands can make a huge impact for business security.
The new year is a great time to take a look at least privilege access- the use of role-based controls to align permissions with job responsibility. Once a frame work is in place your team can conduct annual audits to adjust permissions for your team. This also improves operations as you bring on new staff and promote internally. It is also a way to spot internal data theft, and any suspicious end-point/user activity.
Conduct regular assessments using your cyber insurance policy, document findings and mitigations regularly. Use a 3rd party company, when possible, for fresh perspective. Your team can use this to adapt cyber strategies based on findings to improve cybersecurity as well as identify areas of vulnerability. Sometimes it is about risk mitigation and creating a list of most important assets to protect and then making a long-term plan for any items that can’t be improved right away.
Add EDR- Endpoint Protection and Response this monitors any suspicious activity that could occur and then acts to respond to the threat and alert your team. It will often catch persistent threats that were going undetected. There are two types of EDR Managed and Unmanaged. There are some great tools that be set and will give great reports for your team, but very often will need an experienced team to sift through the alerts. To determine the level of risk and what mitigation is required.
Make sure to work with an IT team that truly understands your business to improve operations and reduce costs for your team. Schedule a call with us today to run a security audit and identify some easy changes to make today.