According to the 2017 study by the Ponemon Institute, it takes businesses an average of 191 days to identify that there’s been a data breach. That means that your sensitive customer data and systems have been compromised for more than six months before you realize that something is happening and begin remediation activities. That’s a staggering amount of time, especially when you consider that many businesses are storing confidential financial and health information for thousands of individuals. This slow response to cyber attacks can put your business in a difficult situation where you’re apologizing to customers about the lack of security around their data. Here are 5 steps that you can take to reduce the possibility your organization will experience a major data breach.
1. Ongoing Training
Any technology professional can tell you that the majority of the breaches they see are caused by a well-meaning individual who shares their password, or someone who takes a step they didn’t realize would be compromising security. This could be anything from clicking a questionable link within their email to forgetting to losing their smartphone or laptop. Ongoing training and awareness for all of your business and technology users can help reduce the possibility of data theft from employees.
2. Active Password Management
Are you confident that all of your users have secure passwords? If you don’t have structures in place to prevent it, you might find that users — even on the technology team — have utilized passwords that are too easily guessed. Having server passwords or logins that still contain “admin” or “administrator” is one of the biggest offenders when it comes to data breaches. This reduces the work that hackers have to do to gain access to your information.
3. Access Reviews
Have you revoked access to all individuals who have left the organization, or who no longer need to see confidential data? Regular access reviews are crucial to maintaining a high level of security. Anytime employees move between teams, it’s a good idea to review their access levels to ensure they can’t accidentally share sensitive information.
4. Intrusion Detection
You don’t want your organization to become a statistic — one of the thousands of companies who took months to determine that your data security had been breached. Implementing regular vulnerability assessments and active intrusion detection ensure that you’re notified quickly of any unauthorized access to information systems so remediation can begin immediately.
5. Behavioral Monitoring
Unauthorized activity from external sources isn’t the only thing you should be monitoring within your cyber security profile. Your team also needs to implement behavioral monitoring, so you can see when even authorized users are taking steps that are unusual or unexpected. This type of monitoring notifies you proactively whenever your network or server access is at an unexpected or unusual level based on past usage.
You can see how each of these various stages of security work together and build upon one another to help reduce the possibility of a data breach within your organization. As a bonus, here’s a sixth way you can ensure your business stays protected: through compliance reporting and accessible analytics. Each level of security integration adds a layer of armor to protect the security of your business and customer data. Ready to boost your cybersecurity protection with our revolutionary CoreArmor cyber security solutions? Contact the professionals at Coretelligent today at 855-841-5888 to find the office nearest you. You can also download our complimentary whitepaper entitled “What You Need to Know About the State of Cybersecurity” today to dig deep into the challenges facing today’s businesses.
