Risk management is imperative to the success and security of today’s technology-driven business environments. However, the implementation and maintenance of an IT risk management program can be resource-intensive, so organizations must invest in cybersecurity risk management solutions. Doing so will offset some of the workload placed on security teams, allowing them to devote more time to high-level risk and manual processes.
For these risk management solutions to be effective, they must align with your company’s individual business needs and risk profile. Understanding how each individual cybersecurity solution quantifies risk will help organizations build more informed risk management programs and ensure security requirements are met.
Here are 4 cybersecurity solutions that your organization can leverage to better mitigate risk.
1. Vulnerability and security assessments
Vulnerability and security assessments provide security teams with an evaluation of any existing or potential vulnerabilities within your organization’s information systems. These evaluations are designed to identify gaps within your cybersecurity posture so that you can determine how to efficiently address each vulnerability.
The most common vulnerability and security assessments are as follows:
Host assessment
A host assessment looks for vulnerabilities within the hardware and software of your systems. Host assessments are extremely important as a security weakness within a software host leaves organizations vulnerable to threats regardless of the security tools used.
Network and wireless assessment
A network and wireless assessment evaluates the policies your organization has in place to prevent unauthorized access to your network and network-accessible resources. This assessment will help you flag potential bottlenecks and improve your security practices.
Database assessment
Database assessments look for potential misconfigurations within data systems that can be exploited by cybercriminals. These evaluations also help organizations classify their data which can help improve both data security and regulatory compliance efforts.
Application scans
Application scans use software to crawl a website to identify vulnerabilities within web applications. These assessments typically provide IT teams with a detailed plan for remediation, saving organizations time and money.
2. Web filtering
Many times, employees unwillingly expose their organization to increased levels of risk by visiting sites that are encoded with malicious malware. If left unchecked, this can result in a data breach and lead to a significant financial and reputational loss for a business. Using a web filter is one way to protect against this as it allows you to block employees from browsing potentially dangerous sites. Also, blocking harmful websites reduces the likelihood of executives being targeted in social engineering attacks.
3. Intrusion detection systems
Intrusion detection systems (IDS) monitor and report malicious activity across a network or system. While an IDS will not prevent an attack, it can be used during risk assessments to help IT teams track the effectiveness of the security controls they have in place. Additionally, the information gathered by an IDS can guide security system updates as it allows IT teams to better qualify attacks. In order to maximize the performance of your intrusion detection system, it is recommended that you pair it with a firewall to block potential attacks.
4. Patch management schedule
Patch management is a crucial aspect of risk mitigation. Failing to patch your machines leaves them vulnerable to exploitation, putting your organization at risk and potentially leading to the loss of customer information. By maintaining a patch management schedule, you can ensure that your systems are updated and prevent further attacks on your network.
The first step in creating a patch management schedule is to take inventory of all software and hardware within your network environment. From here, you will need to assign risk levels to each patch so that you can prioritize what needs to be updated first. This will vary depending on your organization’s risk profile. For example, a company that handles payment card information should first focus on patching point-of-sale machines, as an attack on this system can have serious ramifications for their business.
Before implementing a patch, you will want to run it on a test system to make sure that it will not create any additional security risks once applied. Understanding your vendor’s patch release schedule is paramount to the success of your patch management program. For this reason, it is recommended that you regularly check for new patches and updates to your systems.
How to determine which solutions will work best for your organization
When choosing a cybersecurity solution it is important to first identify the threats that pose the greatest risk to your organization. This will help you determine which risks can be managed internally and which risks require a cybersecurity solution. The industry you are in will also play a role in the solutions that you select as you will need to make sure that they comply with industry-specific regulations.
Supply chain risk should also be considered when investing in cybersecurity solutions. Knowing your organization’s vendor risk level will impact whether or not you need a cybersecurity solution that addresses third-party and vendor threat management.
How SecurityScorecard can help manage risk
When working to mitigate risk, it can be difficult to manage potential threats without visibility across your entire network ecosystem. With SecurityScorecard, this is not an issue. We provide you a set of comprehensive cybersecurity risk solutions that allow you to take a proactive approach to risk management. By leveraging our self-assessment capabilities, you gain an outside-in view of your organization’s cyber health and better understand the risks in your IT infrastructure.
We also provide vendor risk management solutions that can be used to continuously monitor and manage third-party risk within your organization. By assigning a letter grade to each vendor, you can instantly evaluate their security posture and assess the risk they pose to your business. Having up-to-date threat intelligence is a fundamental aspect of successful risk management programs. This is why we take pride in offering unmatched intelligence capabilities that enable security and risk management teams to reduce vulnerabilities before they can be exploited.
Having the ability to mitigate risk is vital for organizations to stay competitive in the digital economy. SecurityScorecards’ cybersecurity solutions help to simplify this process and allow you to better protect critical business processes.
