As we continue to adapt in these unprecedented times, many workplaces have remained fully remote. In fact, some organizations have seen enough benefits from remote work that they are planning a permanent shift away from a traditional office environment, instead having their workforce either partially or fully remote. Whether temporary or permanent, remote work has been a large adjustment for everyone, though perhaps even more so for each organization’s security teams.

While the shift from paper copies to digital storage has enabled organizations to increase efficiency in countless ways, bad actors have also launched countless attacks to steal private information. In order to protect this valuable data, many industries now have cybersecurity regulations. HIPAA has been expanded for healthcare and NERC applies to the utilities and energy sector, and higher education institutions must adhere to HEOA, to name a few.

Effectively managing privileged access has become a top priority for many organizations seeking to protect their data and systems from unauthorized users. That’s because inappropriate access can expose valuable organizational data, compromise sensitive information, and adversely affect system reliability. The latest Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report found that the majority of data breaches leverage privileged accounts directly.

Financial services organizations face numerous challenges in a constantly changing landscape. With increased cybersecurity threats, intensified regulatory requirements, an acceleration of digital transformation, large-scale mergers and acquisitions, and growing customer expectations, these organizations must pursue strategies and programs that mitigate risks, safeguard valuable data, and protect sensitive financial information within their organizations.

According to the 2023 Pen Testing Report, 94% of cybersecurity professionals surveyed felt that penetration testing was somewhat important or important to their organization’s security posture, with 93% also reporting that penetration testing was at least somewhat important to their compliance initiatives.

There is no single set of instructions on how to run a penetration test, and no one manual on how to be a pen tester. The only real constant is that each job is a combination of preparation and improvisation to adapt and adjust to each environment’s quirks. So one of the best ways to learn and improve your own penetration testing techniques and strategies is from your peers, whether it be through watching them on the job, or from talking shop at a conference and hearing how they handled an interesting assignment.

When cyberattacks and data breaches make the news, it’s usually because they’re at large companies like Facebook or healthcare organizations. But every organization, large or small, needs to be concerned about cybersecurity; hackers have begun to understand that, while smaller companies may have less data on hand, they may have access to covetable third parties.

Recently, the need for being able to work remotely has dominated the news, making it clear that the ability to connect from anywhere may soon become the norm for more businesses and industries than ever before. While remote work may be coveted by many employees, it can easily fill your cybersecurity team with dread. Telework can create many new security weaknesses for an IT environment, and can significantly increase your organization’s chance of a devastating data breach. Read on to find out what makes these new network connections so vulnerable, and how you can reduce your risk.

Organizations today may have a false sense of security when it comes to the security of their own environments. In fact, there are numerous ways companies make it easier for threat actors to gain access into their systems undetected. To complicate matters even further, the sheer volume of threats companies face makes it impossible to uncover security events quickly—even if many are benign.

Little fires everywhere – not just a best-selling novel and new streaming show starring Reese Witherspoon: it’s what most respondents said was the biggest impediment to productivity in their workday. Distractions in the form of meetings, urgent emails, and (worst case) system outages force even the most organized sysadmin to push tasks back and cause pileups in the future. Whether or not you’re using the same strategies to stay productive in IT as the ones highlighted below, learn how your peers avoid and overcome hurdles to keep focusing on high-impact tasks.

What common security risks/entry points are you most concerned about?In our 2024 Pen Testing Survey we asked what common security risks concerned respondents most. While phishing (80%) and ransomware (72%) were the top concerns, other options had a high enough percentage to warrant further discussion. These included: 

Voice biometrics, or voiceprint technology, has started gaining significant traction within the financial services industry. And for good reason. Passwords alone are no longer sufficient for protecting business-critical assets and applications. Instead, voiceprint technology instantly recognizes the voice patterns unique to each individual and can authenticate access securely. Industries like financial services are moving away from using passwords for account access and toward secure biometric authentication that is fast, convenient, secure, and cost effective.

According to the 2019 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report, 62 percent of all data breaches last year involved the use of stolen credentials, brute force, or phishing. Nearly half of these types of breaches were directly attributed to stolen credentials. Stolen credentials are not only a risk through active user accounts, but can be a significant risk through orphaned accounts.

All SIEMs are well known for their ability to monitor IT infrastructures for potential threats, escalating them to the appropriate party. Though these solutions share this core function in common, SIEMs differ widely in terms of features. It’s important to evaluate your own environment to determine what your priorities are. For certain organizations, particularly MSPs, multi tenancy is a key functionality.

The term “phishing” can be traced back to 1996, when it was used to reference a group of attackers that were imitating AOL employees using AOL messenger, asking people to verify their accounts or billing information. Many unsuspecting users fell prey to this scam purely due to their novelty. Though we would like to believe that we would never be fooled by such an attack these days, phishing remains as popular as ever. Though internet users may have become more discerning, attackers have also become more skilled in how they’re luring in more victims.

The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), the latest data privacy law in the Golden State, went into effect on January 1st, 2020. Some have compared it to the UK’s GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), and they’re not far off – like the GDPR, the CCPA is intended to protect individuals’ private data by making data collection and usage more transparent between consumers and companies.

Like most companies today, your business is likely facing increasing demands to support and protect more devices and systems that contain data critical to your business. You are spending increasing time and resources on manual, repetitive tasks for managing user accounts. And you are being squeezed by the business to do more with less.

Later this month, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) will release version 1.0 of the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC). The CMMC will be a mandatory third-party certification for any DoD contractors and subcontractors, intended to help protect the government’s sensitive, unclassified data against cyber threats. How did the CMMC come together and what will it entail? Read on to find out other cyber threat mitigation standards, how they inspired the CMMC, and what to expect when the CMMC goes live.

Your organization made the headlines! That’s great, right? Not if it’s because you had sensitive data breached. A data breach can wreak financial and logistical havoc for you, your customers, patients, employees, and others. More importantly, it can severely impact the reputation you’ve so carefully built up and nurtured over time with existing as well as potential customers.

They say what happens in Vegas stays there, right? Well, that may not always be the case. Especially when it comes to the Gartner Identity & Access Management Summit last December. In fact, we are pretty sure the more than 2,200 attendees will take back with them new identity and access management insights, strategies, and intelligence to address their biggest challenges in their own organizations.

There is no arguing that a penetration test can be an invaluable exercise to evaluate the security of an IT infrastructure. Despite the necessity for these critical evaluations, many security teams struggle to maximize the effectiveness of pen tests in their organization. What are the top challenges that organizations are looking at today when facing an upcoming pen test? Read on to find out.

Identity and Access Management (IAM) security is an essential part of overall IT security that manages digital identities and user access to data, systems, and resources within an organization. IAM security includes the policies, programs, and technologies that reduce identity-related access risks within a business. IAM programs enable organizations to mitigate risks, improve compliance, and increase efficiencies across the enterprise.

With cyber attacks continuing to increase, it seems like most security teams are having to learn how to do more, and do it faster. Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) solutions help to efficiently identify and escalate critical security events, enabling a swift and effective response. SIEM use remained a popular security tool in 2019, and shows every sign of remaining prevalent for years to come.

What’s the best way to get a leg up on cybersecurity in 2020? Learning from the biggest problems of the past year can show emerging patterns and trends that can help shape your security strategy, ensuring that you know what to watch for and prioritize. Read on to learn how to deal with four major cyber threats of the past year that will continue to evolve and plague organizations into 2020 and beyond.

Over just a few decades, science fiction has become reality with the advent of cyberspace.  Organizations can instantly communicate across the globe, completing work faster than ever thanks to these innovations. And though cybersecurity quickly became one of the most rapidly growing fields, cyber threats continue to improve right alongside these digital advancements.