Being a cybersecurity professional means you’re regularly in charge of making complex decisions with real-world consequences, like choosing the right cybersecurity benchmarks, controls, frameworks, or best practices for your organization. Should you apply the CIS Controls, the NIST Cybersecurity Framework, or something else? Without overarching industry consensus, it can be...
In an era characterized by relentless digital transformation and interconnectedness, cybersecurity has evolved into a complex and dynamic battleground.
Businesses, governments, and individuals find themselves locked in a perpetual struggle against a relentless flood of evolving threats. From sophisticated cybercriminal syndicates to state-sponsored...
One of the most common factors that can lead to cybersecurity incidents is a security misconfiguration in software or application settings. The default settings that come with the implementation of these tools and solutions are often not configured securely, and many organizations do not invest the time and resources into ensuring that they are.
...
Like every other industry, the healthcare sector is barely recognizable when compared to its state 20 years ago. It, too, has been transfigured by technology. While this has brought many impactful benefits, it has also introduced at least one major challenge: keeping sensitive patient information private.
At the heart of this privacy challenge stands...
Cybersecurity in Mental Healthcare - The Overlooked Risk
Did you know the New-Age Therapeutic sector is unregulated? If that surprises you, then you’re not alone. I was a little surprised, too. Yes, there are various professional bodies a practitioner can join, and there are courses they can attend, but they aren’t forced to.
It should be noted that...
Plastic surgeries across the United States have been issued a warning that they are being targeted by cybercriminals in plots designed to steal sensitive data including patients' medical records and photographs that will be later used for extortion.
The warning, which was issued by the FBI yesterday and is directed towards plastic surgery offices and...
While always a part of business, compliance demands have skyrocketed as the digital world gives us so many more ways to go awry. We all remember the Enron scandal that precipitated the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX). Now, SOX compliance means being above board on a number of cybersecurity requirements as well.
Fortra's Tripwire recently released a new guide:...
When building a tower, it helps to start with a sturdy foundation. Cyber maturity is the tower, and there are three levels that build it:
Foundational IT/OT & Security Control Processes
Fundamental Security Control Capabilities
Advanced Security Control Capabilities
Fortra occupies a unique space in the industry because of the sheer size of the...
Technology companies are often seen as revolving doors of constantly shifting personnel. Whether they are seeking a better work environment or chasing a higher paycheck, these staff changes can hurt an organization’s progress. Worse yet, the customers are often negatively impacted by these changes in the continuity of established relationships.
At...
In the past, teams incorporated security testing far after the development stage of the Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC). Security testing would influence whether the application would to proceed to production, or get passed back to the developers for remediation.
This process caused delays while teams worked on remediation or, worse yet, it...
Penetration testing is something that more companies and organizations should be considering a necessary expense. I say this because over the years the cost of data breaches and other forms of malicious intrusions and disruptions are getting costlier. Per IBM Security’s “Cost of a Data Breach Report 2021,” the average cost of a breach has increased 10%...
We all know that it is a question of when you will be compromised and not if you will be compromised. It is unavoidable. The goal of CIS Control 17 is to ensure that you are set up for success when that inevitable breach occurs. If an organization is neither equipped nor prepared for that potential data breach, they are not likely to succeeded in...
The way in which we interact with applications has changed dramatically over years. Enterprises use applications in day-to-day operations to manage their most sensitive data and control access to system resources. Instead of traversing a labyrinth of networks and systems, attackers today see an opening to turn an organizations applications against it to...
Enterprises today rely on partners and vendors to help manage their data. Some companies depend on third-party infrastructure for day-to-day operations, so understanding the regulations and protection standards that a service provider is promising to uphold is very important.
Key Takeaways from Control 15
Identify your business needs and create a...
Earlier this year, I wrote about what’s new in Version 8 of the Center for Internet Security’s Critical Security Controls (CIS Controls). An international consortium of security professionals first created the CIS Controls back in 2008. Since then, the security community has continued to update the CIS Controls to keep pace with the evolution of...
Users who do not have the appropriate security awareness training are considered a weak link in the security of an enterprise. These untrained users are easier to exploit than finding a flaw or vulnerability in the equipment that an enterprise uses to secure its network. Attackers could convince unsuspecting users to unintentionally provide access to...
Networks form a critical core for our modern-day society and businesses. People, processes, and technologies should be in place for monitoring, detecting, logging, and preventing malicious activities that occur when an enterprise experiences an attack within or against their networks.
Key Takeaways for Control 13
Enterprises should understand that...
Networks form a critical core for our modern-day society and businesses. These networks are comprised of many types of components that make up the networks’ infrastructure. Network infrastructure devices can be physical or virtual and include things such as routers, switches, firewalls, and wireless access points. Unfortunately, many devices are shipped...
Data loss can be a consequence of a variety of factors from malicious ransomware to hardware failures and even natural disasters. Regardless of the reason for data loss, we need to be able to restore our data. A data recovery plan begins with prioritizing our data, protecting it while it is being stored, and having a plan to recover data.
Key...
With the continuing rise of ransomware, malware defenses are more critical than ever before with regard to securing the enterprise. Anti-Malware technologies have become an afterthought in many organizations, a technology that they’ve always had, always used, and never really thought about. This control serves as a reminder that this technology is as...