Data security is a significant concern for organizations of all sizes and industries. Not only is there a risk of fines and reputational damage from a high-profile breach or hack, but companies also face financial costs for remediation, downtime, and lost business.
The good news is that implementing best practices can help reduce exposure risks and protect sensitive information from cyberattacks. This includes ensuring physical and logical protection for servers, routers, firewalls, and data backups.
Security Monitoring
Data is the lifeblood of every organization and can include confidential personal health information, crucial business strategies, intellectual property, and financial records. This makes it a priority for companies to protect their data from cyberattacks and ensure that it doesn’t end up in the wrong hands.
Security monitoring helps to identify threats to your IT system and prevent them from damaging your company’s data. This includes monitoring for signs of unauthorized activity, such as unintentional changes to your network, and taking quick action when it is detected.
An IT support Denver can also include a software development process to create a custom application that meets your business needs. An excellent example of this is a digital adoption platform that can be integrated with other software to help new users learn apps and websites faster and more efficiently.
Security Audits
An extensive assessment of an organization’s IT systems is a security audit, infrastructure, and information-handling processes. It can be performed by an outside third-party expert or the company’s assessment team.
Companies need to have regularly scheduled security audits. This helps them identify gaps in their cybersecurity programs that can be patched before they become more significant problems.
In addition to protecting against data breaches, regular security audits help ensure compliance with regulatory bodies like the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) . They can also help ensure that disaster recovery plans are effective and that the IT team works securely. A well-documented security audit process is critical to ensuring that all relevant information is available for an auditor.
Network Security
IT services are a vital part of every business that relies on technology in some way. These IT teams monitor internet and computer traffic to track who accesses a company’s information and whether or not any systems need repairs or software updates.
IT security services can also protect data from unauthorized personnel and malevolent activities using physical and technical security measures. Physical security uses locks, ID passes, and other means to prevent unauthorized people from physically tampering with network components like routers or cable connections. This kind of protection can be accomplished through both hardware and software solutions.
Technological network security includes firewalls and other software-based solutions that regulate incoming and outgoing information according to a prescribed set of protocols. This helps ensure that a company’s information’s integrity, confidentiality, and availability remain intact.
Cloud Security
As companies collect massive amounts of data from a wide range of applications and cloud environments, they need to understand where that data is, which is being exposed, how it is being used, and any associated risks. This also requires establishing and consistently enforcing protection policies in a flexible, dynamic cloud environment that often sees changes implemented in the fast-charging DevOps CI/CD cycle at scale and velocity.
Complex IT architectures in the cloud can create visibility and control gaps that expose organizations to risks from misconfigurations, vulnerabilities, data leaks, and excessive privileged access. These issues can be compounded by simple end-user negligence and carelessness, often resulting in the accidental exposure of sensitive data sets.
Data Backup
Data backup is the process of making a duplicate copy of your digitized information and IT systems so that you can recover or restore your data in case of damage or deletion. It is a critical component of disaster recovery and business continuity planning.
A comprehensive data protection strategy should include local and offsite/cloud backups. Keeping a backup on-site allows for quick recovery, while offsite/cloud backups reduce the risk of losing important data during a natural or artificial disaster.
Ensure that your employees understand why data security is essential and how they can help prevent a cyber-attack. This will help them avoid common security threats like spear-phishing emails and USB traps. Educating your team will also help to limit the impact of any attacks that do occur.
