Constant pressure to improve your organization's security posture, even in the face of rapidly emerging technologies and policies like BYOD, plagues IT teams the globe over. But identifying security weaknesses and having cyber awareness isn't just the responsibility of IT. It lies with the entire company, not only because of sheer manpower, but also because of how greatly each individual can impact security without even knowing the effect he or she is having.
To better your security posture, you need to be able to discover problems as quickly as possible, and doing that takes the strength of your entire organization.
Leveraging Employees to Identify and Combat Security Weaknesses
Your greatest strength in identifying and combating security threats comes from the same thing you might often consider a weakness — your employees. One of the best ways to improve your ability to spot weaknesses is to train your employees on exactly what to look for and avoid in their communications. They should know what a bad email looks like (it can be incredibly tough to tell!), how threat actors can manipulate you electronically or in person, and what to do if there is any suspicion something is awry.
Aside from what-if training, offer real-world examples to drive the point home and help your employees understand the possible consequences of lack of diligence, which can include anything from losing one customer to downtime to losing your entire business to ransomware.
The more your employees care, the more likely they are to understand how important diligence is. The less they care, the more likely they are to be compromised. If you need to frame the consequences as directly affecting their individual livelihood, that's OK. You'd be telling the truth! Consider, for example, that every time a compromise happens, there will be downtime and lost productivity. Your business can lose money on that. Your employees could lose their annual bonus as a result.
Try to choose an awareness training program or partner that helps your employees understand how important identifying security weaknesses really is, with regard to your specific company. An enterprise won't benefit from the real-world example of a small law firm, just like a small health care office won't benefit from examples only relevant to large hospitals.
Technology Solutions
There are, of course, certain hardware or software solutions you can use to mitigate your risk of not identifying a security weakness. You might use a web filter to block certain categories, for instance, which delivers a notification to you when it has to filter a request. You might also choose physical locks for your servers, a next-generation firewall and regular vulnerability assessments. But whatever you choose, remember that your employees are your greatest assets, largely because they often represent your greatest security weakness themselves.
Protect and Rest
Your ability to correctly and quickly identify security weaknesses is largely dependent on your employees, but where they gain their knowledge is something you can control. Pick an organization that provides awareness training and the right hardware and software, as well as remediation consultation and action, should the time come that you need it.
With that in place, you can rest easy knowing that your organization is fully capable of both spotting and responding to threats. When you have better systems for education, identification and remediation, you're more likely to have a 9 to 5 sort of day — one that allows you to maintain a healthy level of stress...and therefore, a higher quality of life.
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Originally published on 07/26/2016
Topic: Cybersecurity, IT Security
