Cyber attacks are on the rise, all over the world. They disrupt the operations of businesses and government agencies, often result in massive ransomware payments, and, moreover, damage the reputation of the affected companies. Against this backdrop, cyber hygiene has become an important way to increase operational resilience.
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Current cyber hygiene is assessed using a performance monitoring solution that scans IT environments to identify vulnerabilities. The results are presented in a scorecard. All vulnerabilities are scored based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS), an open industry standard for vulnerability assessment. Vulnerabilities can be accurately sorted in this process. After all, an unpatched vulnerability on an executive’s laptop requires significantly more attention than one on an intern’s laptop.
Only a cyber hygiene assessment enables a meaningful roadmap to better manage and protect the IT environment. Continuously conducted cyber hygiene assessments provide every opportunity to understand and consistently improve the current security posture.
Here are the key benefits of good cyber hygiene:
- Tracking unmanaged resources: you can’t protect what you can’t see. Cyber hygiene makes it possible to maintain an up-to-date inventory, identify vulnerabilities, and quickly remediate security breaches.
- Protecting customer data: Cyberhygiene supports a range of security best practices such as patch management, password discipline, appropriate administrator rights, and other measures to enhance data protection.
- Identifying malicious software: Remote work often leads to installations of unapproved software. Often, this software is not properly configured, patched, updated or secured, making it an attractive target for attackers.
- Meeting compliance requirements: By identifying security risks, cyber hygiene facilitates reporting on security status and ensures compliance requirements are met.
Here are the main drawbacks of a lack of cyber hygiene:
- Data loss: if local hard drives and online storage are not backed up and maintained regularly, important data can be lost due to hardware failure, data corruption, mishandling, ransomware or theft.
- Misplaced data: once data is organized in an improper file system, it can be easily misplaced. And this problem increases exponentially as the business grows.
- Software vulnerabilities: Poor patch management and outdated software are a common cause of security breaches. If an organization does not have a process in place to apply patches and updates in a timely manner, hackers can gain access to the network.
- Inadequate vendor risk management: In today’s hybrid IT environments, it is also important to consider the potential security risks posed by third-party vendors and service providers that have access to the network.
Learn more now! Find all the other information you need on cyber hygiene, including best practices with Tanium and a targeted checklist here.