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5 Ways You Can Dramatically Improve Your Security Posture

Many organizations think that purchasing the latest security tools will help them improve their security posture. However, security requires a comprehensive approach to people, process, and technology within the organization. There are ways to impact all three areas and identify ways where you can improve in each area.

In this blog, we share five ways you can dramatically improve your security posture.

Security Awareness Training

Security awareness and training exercises are paramount to a mature security posture. Employees often need a clear message when it comes to the proper controls for security defense. They also need to know what’s in it for them. A potential data breach could impact revenue and jobs within the organization. Therefore, it’s vital that employees know about the severity of a data breach.

Security awareness training is important because it’s potentially your strongest defense against cyber-attacks. Employees need repetition when it comes to phishing and social engineering exercises. A once per year training is just not enough. You can track and share the results of these exercises, so employees know they are improving. You may also distribute an annual company-wide security policy that every employee needs to sign, acknowledging they’ve read the policy and will comply.

Vulnerability Assessments

You can use a vulnerability assessment to get a quick snapshot of your current security posture and find out what areas need critical improvement. A vulnerability assessment is particularly helpful in helping security leaders identify any security gaps within your environment.

The vulnerability can help structure security initiatives for the team to work on and improve. During your assessment, you may find out that your organization is vulnerable to unpatched applications and operating systems. Or, you may find that infrastructure can be hardened with various configuration changes. And, you might find out that your network architecture needs work.

A vulnerability assessment can improve your overall security posture by pinpointing problems and showing you the big picture.

Red Team vs. Blue Team Exercises

You can improve your security posture by regularly conducting red team versus blue team exercises. This helps your team prepare for real-life security incidents and identify weaknesses within your environment.

These exercises are also helpful in seeing where the security team can improve on detection and response in the cyber kill chain. Red team exercises are helpful when an organization already has implemented several security measures, and the team needs to test their controls thoroughly. A red team exercises may not be the best for an organization that knows its security posture is in trouble or the early stages of maturity.

Automation & AI

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and automation through machine learning (ML) has become one of the hottest areas in information security. And, rightfully so! Security analyst can spend a lot of time sifting through security alerts generated by an array of security devices. Automation and AI help make sense out of the noise generated by these devices and quickly detect and respond to real cyber attacks.

Automation and AI can significantly improve an organization’s Meant-Time-to-Detect (MTTD) and Mean-Time-to-Respond (MTTR). Two critical metrics to track the maturity of a security team. AI and advanced analytics help the security team use dynamic risk analysis as well as predictive anomaly detection to support anti-malware prevention and detection. 

Augment Your Security Team

If you’re looking to improve the overall posture of your security program rapidly, your best bet may be to outsource various functions to a managed security services provider (MSSP). Why might you ask? MSSPs leverage proprietary and cutting-edge security technologies alongside a team of seasoned security analysts to support your organization.

An MSSP literally becomes an extension of your team, learning the ins and outs of your industry, current threat landscape, and the compliance and regulatory requirements your organization may face. The security provider can put together a comprehensive security roadmap that aims to improve your security posture with distinguishable milestones and targets. An MSSP can even conduct phishing and security awareness training exercises with your staff and report on the effectiveness to your leadership team.

Managed security services are probably the single best way to dramatically and quickly improve your security posture. However, if you’re committed to improving your security posture on your own, following the steps above can help your organization imbed cybersecurity into its culture.

6 Reasons to Leverage an MSSP

*** This is a Security Bloggers Network syndicated blog from Cipher Cyber Security Blog authored by Cipher. Read the original post at: http://blog.cipher.com/5-ways-you-can-dramatically-improve-your-security-posture