Network security is constantly evolving. To stay ahead of bad actors, follow these 10 best practices to reduce the risk of data compromise.
1. Review the basics
As obvious as it sounds, it’s always good to start by auditing the basic security elements of your network:
- Are your facilities, servers and systems physically secure? Are access and surveillance systems up to date?
- Is all software and firmware updated?
- Are your password protocols strong enough?
- Do you require multifactor authentication?
- Have you reviewed and tested your firewalls?
Regular reviews of the basic elements of network security, including reminding employees of their own responsibilities, allows you to identify and correct elementary vulnerabilities. You may be surprised what you find.
2. Ensure you have end-to-end visibility
Enterprises like yours need end-to-end visibility to see everything that happens on your network in an instant, with all the high-fidelity metadata at your fingertips so you can know in real time how users, devices, systems and applications are behaving on the network.
OpenTextTM Network Detection and Response gives you a 360-degree view of the network.
3. Aggregate your data in a SIEM
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) technologies aggregate activity from your network. However, SIEMs and other security analytics solutions are only as good as the data being fed into the systems. Without good data, these systems are unable to conduct the correlation that provides the insights enterprises are seeking. Without good data, these systems are unable to conduct the correlation that provides the insights enterprises need.
OpenText NDR enables organizations to respond to alerts in real time, with frictionless integrations with SIEM workflows and third-party threat intelligence tools.
4. Employ proactive threat hunting
Threat hunting is a proactive measure that can uncover anomalies in your network, such as non-human patterns, spikes of activity outside normal business hours and other red flags that may indicate an attack, insider theft or intentional destruction of data.
OpenText NDR is a fully integrated network threat hunting platform that combines micro-second malware analysis, next-generation Intrusion Detection and Prevention Systems (IDPS) enriched network metadata and full packet capture into a single platform, enabling organizations to achieve total visibility while reducing time to containment and operating costs.
5. Have a response playbook
With severe data breaches becoming commonplace, there are plenty of best practices, both pre- and post-incident, to help security teams avoid the headlines. The modern chief information security officer should expect and plan for their organization to be breached. Many organizations are now shifting their resources from perimeter protection to incident response with a mindset of continuous compromise.
Your incident response playbook is the “Bible” for your team to follow when a threat is identified, from your incident response plan to business continuity.
6. Hire a certified internal threat analyst
Your Security Operations Center (SOC) is the heart of your network’s integrity. Who you hire, and what level of certification they have, is essential to the health of your SOC.
Hiring an internal threat analyst who has reached at least Level 2 in a highly regarded certification such as Certified Information Security Manager (CISM) or Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) will ensure you have the skills to work with advanced Network Detection and Response platforms like OpenText’s.
7. Access to the PCAP
Packet capture (PCAP) involves intercepting a data packet as it moves through your network, storing it temporarily so it can be analyzed for security purposes. Once a packet is captured, it is stored temporarily so that it can be analyzed. The packet is inspected to help diagnose and solve network problems and determine whether network security policies are being followed. Hackers can also use packet capturing techniques to steal data that is being transmitted over a network.
OpenText NDR is the only fully integrated network threat hunting platform that combines micro-second malware analysis, next generation IDPS-enriched network metadata, and Smart PCAP into a single platform, enabling organizations to achieve total visibility while reducing time to containment and operating costs.
8. Use a managed solution
A managed solution runs the daily operations of your business’ applications across product portfolios and in any cloud or on-premises environment. It provides the compliance, security, and availability you need and expect, freeing up in-house IT to focus on the core competencies of the business.
OpenText Managed Services, for example, migrates, updates, optimizes or manages applications in on-premises, cloud, or hybrid environments.
9. Compare real cost-effectiveness
When analyzing the total cost of ownership of your integration solutions, thoroughly evaluate both apparent and hidden software and hardware costs of integration tools.
Even more importantly, you need to account for the costs related to implementing, supporting, maintaining, updating, and growing integrated environments. Integration resourcing costs represent a majority of overall integration costs. Leveraging Managed Services can help reduce integration costs.
10. Trust an experienced partner
Security is all about trust; trust that’s earned through experience—yours and that of organizations that you respect. OpenText™ Security Solutions experts leverage extensive experience to identify security risks and implement programs to keep systems safe and protected. Retailers such as 1-800-Flowers, financial institutions including Edward Jones and US Intelligence Community agencies turn to OpenText to help keep their networks secure.
OpenText can help your business stay prepared and in a trusted state by identifying and eliminating blind spots in the network. Learn more about OpenText’s threat detection and response solutions and try OpenText NDR for free today to search, hunt and explore real data in a cloud lab environment.
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Contact us at any time to speak with one of our security experts.
