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Today, countless managed cyber security service providers offer their services, and they are right to do so, as SMEs need cyber protection more than ever. However, knowing how to pick one and understand the critical aspects of a good cyber security plan is essential.
What is included in managed cyber security services?
Cyber security providers help organisations and companies of all sizes to protect their data and business processes against unauthorised access, malware and cyber threats. To achieve this, they offer various sets of cyber security services.
Managed cyber security services may vary depending on the provider. In all cases, they must involve trained IT professionals who are well educated and experienced in the field. They need to perform complex tasks, including monitoring, testing, analysis, detection, prevention, cloud architecture and much more.
An effective cyber security service would typically involve three main areas of focus:
- Assessment: Analyse the current security state, performance needs and possible threats
- Prevention: Plan, create and implement a strategic approach and deploy software and hardware equipment
- Monitoring: Monitor suspicious behaviour, log and record occurring attacks, detect damage
- Recovery and remediation: Bring systems back to a safe state, repair and strengthen systems.
What is a complete cyber security program comprised of?
A complete cyber security plan needs to cover several different sections. Some factors that need to be considered are the security of applications, data, cloud, operations, network, the physical environment and business-critical infrastructure. Others include a business continuity plan with disaster recovery and prevention strategies such as end-user education.
However, to cover all of the aspects mentioned above, teams, operational processes and cutting-edge technology need to work in sync with each other. That’s why a complete program involves effective communication between the managed service provider and the business looking to improve its cybersecurity measures.
Starting from staff education and continuous monitoring, with such a plan, you can protect your business 24/7.
Who needs cyber security services?
Various cyber attacks have a tremendous impact on businesses of all sizes. The adverse outcomes are often related to a significant financial impact, reputational damage and customer data/personal data leaks. Phishing, malware, and ransomware attacks are among the most frequently encountered cyber attacks in recent years.
While many think cyber criminals target large corporations with unlimited resources, the opposite seems to be happening more often. And it’s only logical, given that small businesses lack the knowledge, budget or human resources to create effective security strategies.
In short, managed cyber security services are necessary for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) who don’t have the opportunity to spend a fortune and hire an entire in-house cyber security team. The business needs cyber security solutions if it works with personally identifiable and sensitive information, such as financial data, innovative ideas and prototypes, digital contracts and legal documents.
Does a cyber security plan protect your business?
A well-designed cyber security plan can protect your business on many levels, including physical data centres, cloud infrastructure (in case you use cloud services), device management, authorised access, online business communication and much more.
Prevention strategies already start from end-user education and significantly reduce the chance of accidentally downloading malware used for malicious purposes or giving out confidential customer information if an employee opens an email spam/phishing attempt. Additional security measures such as anti-spam and anti-virus software can also be deployed to reduce the risk of potential threats further.
You get constant monitoring and an alert for a potential threat giving you time to react and prevent a cyber attack. In the long term, together with AI and ML algorithms, they allow you to predict cyber threats.
Medium and small business owners can get complete network visibility thanks to a security plan if the provider offers protection at DNS levels and online content filtration. Together with firewalls and antivirus software, these strategies protect businesses by detecting threats and preventing them from becoming data breaches that result in identity theft, ransomware or similar.
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How can you prevent security threats from becoming security incidents?
The best way for a small or medium-sized business to prevent security threats from becoming security incidents is to implement a well-thought and planned cyber security strategy. If they do not have an in-house IT team or limited IT resources, investing in a scalable and budget-friendly solution such as a managed cyber security service provider is best.
A professional and experienced security consultant team such as Network Fish’s IT specialists will collaborate closely with your executive or management team to tailor the perfect solution for your business. The process will include all the pillar steps to creating a successful security strategy – assessment, prevention, monitoring, recovery and remediation.
The best way to deal with security challenges is to create an interconnected ecosystem where systems and people are synced, and predefined step-by-step processes are in place. End-user education, DNS protection and state-of-the-art AI and ML algorithms are only some of the methods that will help you avoid security incidents.
Protect your valuable data regardless of your employees’ location or device
Unfortunately, cyber security doesn’t revolve only around exterior threats. More often than not, security breaches can come from the inside of an organisation. This could happen accidentally (an incautious employee) or intentionally (e.g. vengeful actions), but whatever the case may be, such breaches can cause tremendous damage to any organisation.
By investing in managed cyber security services, you can rest assured that you have complete control over your remote workers’ devices to conduct business. An expert team can easily prevent unauthorised access by enforcing strong passwords, two-factor authentication or encrypting data such as digital documents.
You can create a predefined set of rules to manage the type of data people can access or completely restrict access to sensitive data. Business leaders can also get notifications every time an employee signs into his account from a new device or a location and allow or deny access accordingly.
What is an Incident Response (IR) plan, and why should your company have one?
Although cyber security plans aim at preventing cyber threats and incidents, new security challenges are constantly emerging. That’s where an Incident Response (IR) plan becomes an inevitable part of an excellent cyber security strategy.
Incident Response is a predefined step-by-step plan and written instructions in case a cyber incident occurs.
The plan and its instructions may vary depending on the attack type/scenario, but in its essence, it should contain specific actions and give answers to the following questions:
- How to mitigate cyber security risks?
- How do we avoid further damage?
- How to reduce recovery time?
An IR plan helps your company ensure business continuity and limit potential damage caused by a cyber security incident. Such a plan can save you lots of financial resources, keep your reputation clean, prevent loss of customers and even legal actions against your organisation.
What is Patch Management, and why is it important?
Patching refers to code changes which is a frequently overlooked cyber security aspect. Patch management comprises various systems (including security systems) with different features to fix bugs and improve security and functionality.
Patch management is a critical part of the strategy if you want to achieve high-level hardware and network security. It’s directly related to the organisation’s IT infrastructure and software changes, thus requiring in-depth knowledge and a good overview of the company’s processes and digitalised and interconnected ecosystems.
A good team of cybersecurity experts can help your business comply with the most current privacy and security regulations.
Reliable and secure networks have never been more critical.
Reliable and secure networks have never been more critical than they are today. With the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, many businesses started operating remotely, which required more precautions than usual. Workers started connecting through various and sometimes unsafe internet connections, and others began logging in to their email accounts or other internal software accounts from personal devices.
All of the above is caused a peak in cyber crime and phishing attacks, as more and more employees expose their workplace data at risk without even knowing it. That’s why more companies and businesses are turning to managed cybersecurity services. A well-designed cybersecurity program can ensure that your business is protected and functioning.
How can Cybersecurity Awareness Training help your employees?
The importance of cybersecurity awareness training is directly related to the pain point mentioned in the previous section. Employees rarely know how to recognise a cybersecurity risk if they’re not adequately trained, which potentially can turn into an attack against the organisation.
A crucial part of a well-planned and executed cyber security plan is end-user training. A managed service provider such as Network Fish can educate your employees on recognising phishing emails, as sometimes they are highly personalised and may be mistaken for a genuine inquiry.
But that’s not all. The awareness training will include multiple sections, including password security, compliance and privacy issues, data in motion and more.
What is SIEM, and why is it essential for your enterprise systems?
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) is a security management system that helps businesses analyse events in real-time, thus enabling them to detect threats early on and prevent severe cyber attacks such as data breaches. SIEM design can be incredibly complex, combining behaviour analytics, statistical correlations, automation and response and much more.
SIEM adoption helps companies comply with payment and privacy regulations worldwide, prioritise incident management, shorten the time for threat identification and response, get security alerts and spot patterns in persistent attacks.