Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) often lack the resources needed to adopt a strong security posture. Given the unrelenting escalation of cyberattacks, SMBs can’t afford to skimp on security. With attacks potentially costing companies hundreds of thousands of dollars, smaller organizations can be driven out of business.
Because many SMBs use hybrid workplaces in which employees split time between the office and remote work, cybersecurity is crucial. The remote devices employees use can serve as entry points for hackers.
SMBs need to make smart investments in hardware and software to prevent and minimize the impact of ransomware and other types of attacks. By investing in a few key areas of IT security, SMBs can strengthen their security posture significantly.
Here’s an overview of five ways SMBs can improve their overall approach to cybersecurity.
1) Security Risk Assessment
A great place to get started with improving your SMB’s cybersecurity is with a security risk assessment. Many cyber insurance companies require an external vulnerability scan before providing cyber liability coverage. A security risk assessment can uncover vulnerabilities and gaps in your security strategy.
Once these risks have been uncovered, you can determine which hardware or software tools or processes are needed to fill any gaps. Undergoing a security risk assessment enables your company to take a targeted and efficient approach to bolstering your security.
2) Network Segmentation
Network security is key because cybercriminals can use the network to move laterally across your system, from device to device and into the data center and the cloud, once they have found an entry point.
Network segmentation enables your SMB to reduce its attack surface by dividing the larger network architecture into smaller, discrete networks which isolate traffic and allow your company to set specific security and access controls for each segment.
The two major types of network segmentation are:
- Macro Segmentation, which breaks up a network into pieces, such as development and production environments, to support business needs
- Micro Segmentation, which divides a network into smaller pieces at the workload level
3) Next-Generation Firewall
Today’s business environments, with their geographically dispersed offices and hybrid workplaces, put a strain on traditional firewalls. A next-generation firewall (NGFW) has network filtering functions that aren’t available in traditional firewalls.
These functionalities include:
- Website Filtering
- Traffic Inspections
- Third-Party Identity Management
With NGFW, application firewalls leverage intrusion prevention systems (IPS) or deep packet inspections (DPI).
4) Extended Detection and Response
As today’s companies increasingly rely on endpoint devices, such as laptops and tablets to do business, endpoint protection has become crucial for preventing cyberattacks. Extended detection and response (XDR) is at the cutting edge of endpoint security.
XDR works across networks, cloud-hosted applications, and endpoints to optimize network visibility, deepen threat analysis, and enhance response capabilities. XDR provides analytic insights into managed endpoint devices and exerts more control over how endpoints function and what they can access.
5) Multifactor Authentication
Identity and access control is necessary for preventing bad actors, whether internal or external, from gaining unauthorized access to sensitive information. Passwords, or single-factor authentication methods, are easy for hackers to crack.
Multifactor authentication (MFA) requires that users present two or more credentials, such as a token, biometric fingerprint scan, or single-use code, to access a website or application. MFA is easy to implement and enforce across an organization. Access can be controlled based on job level so employees can use only the data they need to do their work.
Find and Bridge Your Security Gaps
Don’t wait for a cyberattack to cripple your business before you invest in IT security. Get started by partnering with a technology company that has expertise in cybersecurity for a risk assessment.
Derive Technologies provides free network security assessments. We can evaluate every aspect of your security posture, find gaps, and recommend the best ways to bridge them.
Derive can help you prevent ransomware and other malware attacks and provide ways to recover quickly from attacks that do succeed so you can reduce downtime and data loss to an absolute minimum. As a Cisco Premier Certified Partner, we help our customers leverage leading network security solutions.
blog
