Is Your Biggest Cyber Security Threat Inside Your Company?

According to the Kaspersky Lab’s study over 5,000 businesses around the globe, employees are the biggest weakness to IT security for 52 percent of them.

With cyber security becoming a major concern these days, businesses are adopting every possible measure to tackle outside threats. While outside security threats seem quite menacing, insider security risks can be equally dangerous for your network safety.

Insider threats can come from anywhere, be it inconsistent password policies or unmanaged data in the personal devices of your employees. Such threats are often difficult to spot and stop. Quite possibly, the person sitting in the cubicle next to yours might be using weak passwords for email access, and putting sensitive information at risk. Insider threats often lead to electronic theft, stolen credentials, misaddressed emails and unintentional data leaks.

Motivated by any personal or financial interest, your employees can expose sensitive data to unauthorized sources. Many a time, because of their negligence, the data in their system is compromised by outsiders.

So, what steps can be taken to mitigate insider threat risks?

Before mulling over the ways to tackle insider threats, let’s understand in detail the major types of insiders:

• Former Employees
• Outside Consultants
• Business Partners
• Privileged IT Users
• Third-Party Contractors
• Employees with Admin Capabilities

There can be some malicious insiders like disgruntled former employees who can steal or damage your data. Even the IT staff with complete admin access can expose data to insiders, driven by vested interests.

As the need of the hour, managers and corporate leaders need to focus on the following security practices.

Monitor Your Employees’ Behaviour

As an organization, you need to segregate those users who have the potential to pose severe damage to your critical information. You need to address the cyber security threat that your employees represent. Devices of your IT admins, key vendors and top executives need to be administered with greater vigilance.

Technologies like mobile device management solutions allow employers to view & control devices of their employees through single sign-on experience. Using MDM software, you can manage multiple mobile platforms from a single interface, and ensure that your employees abide by cyber security policies. You can remotely view and control employee devices to keep corporate security intact.

Keep Your Assets Secure

Identify the most critical data of your organization which requires frequent monitoring. For such assets, you need to adopt robust defences like locking devices when they are not in use. Also, you can get a secure file transfer system, which encrypts the information while they are shared through emails. Through file transfer systems, you can further ensure that only authorized email recipients can access the information.

Furthermore, you should keep your systems secure with effective password management and restricted user access. Provide access to only those data which an employee needs to perform the task at hand. Moreover, when employees leave, disable their accounts to prevent them from fetching your valuable data.

Stick to the Basics

Compromising on the basics can wreak havoc on your network security. So, opt for automatic software patches and ensure stronger policies for passwords and user identities to avoid security loopholes.

Furthermore, stay away from social engineering ploys in the form of suspicious emails and calls. Cyber criminals often get access to your login information and encrypted files through phishing emails and messages.  To avoid phishing emails, check for spellings, as legitimate messages are written with caution. Also, review the signature, as genuine emails often have complete contact details.

Adopt Deep Analytics

Deep analytics and AI technologies can be used to identify any behavioural deviation by individual employees accessing a system or data. One of the top email security solutions is Galaxkey, which allows you to secure your message, attachments and files efficiently. It provides complete control over the information shared via Outlook, iOS, Android and Windows.

Data management solutions can further help you identify any anomaly in employee or device behaviour that can result in the data being compromised. Consequently, you can automatically cut off those devices that are facing cyber security threats. Alerts can be sent to the concerned people if any potential threat appears.

Suggested Read: Top 12 Managed Security Service Providers (MSSP) in India

Lastly, Prepare for the Worst

While you are adopting preventive measures, you cannot deny the fact that cyber-attacks are here to stay. Make sure you are fully ready to combat cyber security threats by backing up your sensitive data regularly. And, adopt some of these smart ways to protect data from falling into the wrong hands