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The average cost of a cyberattack has reached $4.88 million. That’s made adhering to core cybersecurity principles more important than ever. But these can get lost in the noise of our complicated modern IT infrastructures.
So, where does your business stand? This guide will help you answer that question with a review of key cybersecurity principles and best practices.
Overview of Cybersecurity Principles
The basic principles of cybersecurity provide a high-level overview of what organizations must do to protect themselves. They’re worth reviewing as you consider your IT infrastructure’s security strengths and weaknesses.
Protect
First, protect your core systems from unauthorized access. You can do that in many ways, including:
- Encrypting sensitive data
- Installing strict access controls
- Backing up critical information so it can be restored if necessary
Verify that you have a protection plan in place for all important internal systems and data sets. It may be wise to use overlapping security to protect especially sensitive information.
For instance, you could back up customer data from your CRM software and install strict access controls. That way, if access controls fail, your company will still have the information it needs to move forward.
Monitor
Next, put systems in place to monitor your networks continuously. Doing so will help you detect and address potential threats faster. The speed at which your organization responds to a breach can determine how impactful it is.
Dell Technologies offers a variety of intrusion detection systems that can help with this, including Secureworks and hardware-based solutions like the Chassis Intrusion Switch.
Assess
Cybercriminals are constantly hunting for new ways to attack businesses. That’s one reason why cybersecurity risk assessments are valuable. They help you understand how your company may be attacked so you can deal with the threats before they reach you.
Another reason is that companies typically have limited budgets for cybersecurity. The assessment process can help you determine the ideal way to spend yours.
For example, you may want to invest more heavily in protection against common phishing attacks. But if you calculate the probability of a certain kind of attack to be low, you may not need to spend as much to guard against it.
Respond
Next, create response plans before you need them. Time is often of the essence when addressing attacks, and a good plan will help you take the ideal actions faster.
For example, during a live breach, your first instinct may be to identify the source of the attack. However, that’s not always the best first step. It could be smarter to contain the attack before investigating its origins. When you have a response plan in place, you’re likelier to take correct actions.
Incident Management
Incident management is similar to the principle of response. The main idea of each is preparing for how you’ll manage attacks in advance. This usually looks something like:
- Prepare: Create policies and procedures to follow when responding to different kinds of incidents.
- Detect: Establish systems for breach discovery so you get the information you need to respond quickly.
- Contain and recover: Know how you’ll contain different attacks to limit their damage and recover from them as soon as possible.
- Post-incident review: Create a process for learning from attacks to improve application security moving forward.
Least Privilege
Another core principle is the concept of least privilege. This means limiting who can access your protected systems to only those who absolutely must. For instance, don’t give every new employee full access to all of your sensitive data by default. Instead, only approve them for the systems or databases they need to do their jobs — and nothing more.
This limits your attack surface by reducing the number of avenues hackers could potentially exploit. It also helps with containment in the event of a successful breach.
For example, if an employee falls victim to a phishing attack, only the systems they have access to are threatened. That could be a small number if your organization follows the principle of least privilege.
Confidentiality
Confidentiality is similar to the principle of least privilege. It means limiting access to sensitive information to authorized users only. Of all the privacy principles in cybersecurity, confidentiality may be the most foundational. If you aren’t limiting who can access your private systems, you don’t have much of a defense.
Accountability
Next, accountability is the act of assigning cybersecurity tasks to designated leaders. These people have ownership over different aspects of your overall plan. It's a critical principle because it encourages follow-through. When someone becomes directly responsible for an outcome, they tend to invest in it more.
Detect
Finally, verify you have sufficient detection procedures in place. That can include analyzing event logs regularly and setting up the appropriate alerts on your monitoring system. You may also want to review incident escalation procedures. If there's an attack, your best people should be prepared to address it as quickly as possible.
Application of Principles
Understanding foundational cybersecurity principles is a good first step toward protecting your business. Your should next apply those principles to the systems you protect.
Network Security
One of the most important principles for network security is confidentiality. If your network is confidential, only authorized users will be allowed to access it. That’s why access controls are such an important part of preventing system hacking incidents in this area. You can use controls like:
- Strong passwords
- Multifactor authentication
- Segmenting networks into small, isolated parts
- Following the principle of least privilege
In line with the principle of protection, you may also consider encrypting transmitted data. This adds an additional layer of safety to your network. Even if someone intercepted sensitive data, they would need your unique decryption key to understand it.
Cloud Security
Cloud security has become increasingly important as more organizations store information across public and private clouds. The complexity of these systems makes assessment a critical principle to apply.
For example, you may need to complete a cloud security assessment covering:
- Potential vulnerabilities
- The risk of those vulnerabilities being exploited
- Data backups
- Control challenges
- Other factors
Dell Technologies’ cybersecurity resources include CloudLink, which simplifies protecting your cloud environment. It’s a single management solution for multiple clouds so that you can control security from a single unified dashboard.
Endpoint Protection
Any strategy for how to prevent cyber threats should also include a section on endpoint protection. However, this has become challenging as hybrid work environments proliferate.
The principle of detection is important here. If employees can access sensitive networks on their own devices, you need to be able to detect when an attack is launched through those devices.
One option is connecting employee devices to remote monitoring software. That way, you’ll get an immediate alert if an endpoint attack succeeds.
These are just a few examples of how a cybersecurity principle can inform a specific protective strategy. Ultimately, it’s worth considering each core principle when designing any piece of your protection.
Tools and Resources
There are a variety of tools, resources, and frameworks that can help you adhere to core cybersecurity principles. Dell's Secureworks and CloudLink are two software-based options to consider. There are also hardware-based options and third-party organizations that can help with security.
As part of your strategy, you may also want to review common frameworks. These provide detailed instructions for creating a security system that embraces the best principles.
For example, the National Institute of Standards and Technology's NIST Cybersecurity Framework is a popular choice. It’s a government-designed framework for identifying, protecting, and responding to cyberattacks. Other commonly used options include:
- ISO 27001 and ISO 27002
- CIS Controls
- SOC2
- PCI-DSS
The Importance of Understanding Cybersecurity Principles
Cybercrime is constantly evolving — and so should your defenses. As you consider the best ways to improve, keep these cybersecurity principles in mind. They highlight the most important aspects of cyber defense and can help to verify you’re not missing anything essential.
You can also visit the Dell Learning Center to read about the latest threats and new strategies for containing them.