It is good if a tool is working and nothing bad is happenning with our IT infrastructure. However, it is still essential for use to keep our security tools updated. Attackers may continuously look for new ways and methods to compromise and harm our systems. It means that we shouldn’t invest or buy products that worth little to the overall security values. We should decide tools that we should implement and understand why they could be very similar.
This could be a unique problem for companies, as consumers of IT security solutions. Tools could look roughly the same. Marketers have almost similar claims with similar wording on their marketing material. Yet, they may cost absolutely different and the real driver should be the level of researches vendors need to invest in the product developments. It could be a key differentiator in any industry, in terms of security solutions. Some vendors develop and invest heavily on their original proprietary solutions.
IT security vendors should keep up with advances in the industry, so they will be better positioned to fully protect client’s infrastructures and systems. They could face specific attacks that they need to deal quickly and it may not be easy to find the kind of protection that could withstand very recent threats in IT security. Obviously costs could be the main factor. Businesses should also consider to where most threats could come from, is it malicious insider or a dangerous external hacker.
We have seen headlines about hacking attacks that focus on business-based systems. Most are about threats from external factors, including website defaces, theft of confidential data and breaking into systems. It could affect brand equity, since a large amount of money could lose due to external threats. However, companies should also consider about internal attacks, especially when there are a number of employees who have high level access to the database. Some of them could become disgruntled due to company’s recent policies and misuse their access for illegal attempts.
These internal threats may have access to a large amount of data, which can be sold to the highest bidder. In some cases, malicious insiders could cause the most damages, especially if they leak out company’s future plans and designs. For this reason, companies should retain and train skilled security experts. The real challenge would be to get any actionable intelligence out of existing security staff and tools. Companies should be able to analyze gathered data and determine whether they are under attack, internally or externally.
So, it is clear that we should understand various elements that have an involvement in the IT security field. Obviously, the whole thing could be quite complicated if we see it from the ground up. When we see data centers, we will find servers, VPN systems, firewalls, encryption tools and others, which care quite intimidating. Managers should look their IT infrastructure from the top down, so it would be easier for them to manage IT risks related to their businesses.