Nowhere has the sudden shift to remote working been more affected in the IT stack than in cybersecurity. Access to potentially sensitive company data now must take place from personal networks — and frequently from personal devices — outside of the tight controls of company IT systems.
According to research from cybersecurity specialist Tanium, 90% more cyberattacks than usual were reported in the first two months of the pandemic, and the latest Google Transparency Report showed a 20% increase in the number of phishing websites since January 2020.
Security professionals are no strangers to new threats and challenges, but the rapid transition to remote work combined with (or caused by) the increase in threats have made them reconsider security priorities and look harder for advantages and efficiencies.
The endpoint: where business — and post-compromise activity — begins
Many recent high-profile breaches, particularly ransomware incidents, started with a compromised endpoint. Endpoints’ weaknesses are various: a misconfigured RDP client that exposes credentials and allows the elevation of security privileges, a phishing email leading to malware injection mechanisms, or zero-days like Eternal Blue.
In a remote-work world, the potential for bad actors succeeding is much greater. The siloed nature of teams and the distributed workforce means that organizations need more and continuity in their endpoints, and that is a situation that is not going away any time soon. Business leaders have started to realize that COVID-19 is an endemic disease we must learn to live with for months — if not years.
In a world changed permanently by a single outbreak of a virus, ensuring business resilience is challenging, to say the very least.
One way that organizations can take steps to protect themselves is to reduce exposure to potential threats outside the security department’s immediate control. Unfortunately, that usually involves a significant investment in infrastructure. Or at least, it has until now. In fact, using the latest in cloud-based security technologies, the new paradigm can be addressed with zero infrastructure.
That has been enabled by the large cloud providers relocating solutions both on-premise and in edge data centers. The expansion of clouds to these new locations is good for the business and increases the quality of the end-user’s experience. Even though there is a greater density of connected devices, latency can be reduced, and distributed systems can be better supported.
As business kicks into gear again, being in ‘survival mode’ is no longer an excuse, and there is no going back to old ways. Businesses must now adapt to the change and embrace it. The webinar Driving Intelligence to the Edge and Beyond will address the new challenges whipped up in the last few pivotal months — it will identify and confront the new paradigms we must now embrace to ensure business resilience.
Led by business leaders from EY, Forrester, and Tanium, conversations will tackle the two key remote working challenges — security and management — and whether a ‘zero infrastructure’ approach holds water.
Attendees can expect a deep dive into the ‘New Edge’, or the ways hyperscale cloud providers are expanding services that support the technical demands of a distributed workforce and pressures placed on ‘traditional’ networks. The experts will also tackle how shattered global supply chains and weather-beaten partnerships have led to the emergence of a new, more advanced IT ecosystem.
It promises, in short, to be a conversation that takes stock of and adds clarity to the complexity faced by all of us in business, engaging us to action effective change in the IT function befitting of an entirely new world of work — Driving Intelligence to the Edge and Beyond takes place August 27 and you can register here.
source; techwireasia
