Cyber security is a niche in Information Technology that focuses on protecting digital assets from different cyber threats. The best way to understand cyber security is through the use of the CIA triad, a combination of 3 objectives that illustrates the goals of cyber security in protecting your business. CIA stands for confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
- Confidentiality means making sure that information can only be accessed by authorized individuals.
- Integrity ensures that information is accurate and protected from unauthorized changes/modifications.
- Availability means ensuring that your IT services are available for those that need them when they need them.
To fulfill these three objectives, there are multiple cyber security services that companies need to invest in:
Vulnerability Management/Penetration Testing: This area of cyber security is dedicated to finding and fixing vulnerabilities in company products and infrastructure. A vulnerability is a weak point in a system that may allow someone to compromise it. Detecting and correcting vulnerabilities is critical to ensuring that the company is secure overall.
Identity and Access Management: Focuses on ensuring that only authorized individuals have access to significant company resources. It works to enforce the principle of least privilege; this means that people should only have access to resources required to do their job and nothing more.
Incident Response: This area of cyber security is dedicated to detecting and resolving cyber security incidents. Incidents in cyber security are any event that may indicate that a system may be compromised or that the controls in place to protect the systems are failing.
Risk Management/Compliance: Another critical area of cyber security is managing risk and compliance. Compliance is ensuring that you have all the required security controls mandated by applicable regulations. Risk Management is ensuring the company is aware of and mitigating all relevant risks related to cyber security; for example, a standard risk that needs to be evaluated are third-party vendors.
Who is at Risk of Cyber Attacks?
The short answer is that anyone on the internet is at risk of a cyber-attack. Hackers use automated bots to scan all publicly accessible websites, web applications, and systems for vulnerabilities; this means that anyone can be a target of a cyber-attack. However, some industries are considered more prime targets than others. The most targeted industries when it comes to cyberattacks are healthcare, financial institutions, and the government sector. Also, the company’s size is part of the profile of potential hackers. Small and medium-sized companies tend to present easier targets as security protection is generally a lower priority due to its complexity and associated costs.
The most common cyber threats include ransomware, phishing, and DDOS attacks. Ransomware, in particular, has grown in popularity because of its ability to generate the attackers’ excessive profit from the victim. To get a better idea of the risk to your business, companies should strive to do a formal cyber-attack risk assessment at least once per year.
Why do you need IT Security Services?
IT security services are an essential part of business for several reasons. First is the financial cost; the average cost of a data breach has risen to over $4 million, making it an extremely costly situation to deal with. In addition to the data breach itself, you need to factor in potential IT downtime; it’s estimated that an hour of IT downtime can cost a company as much as $42,000. Secondly, companies have a regulatory responsibility to protect customer information; these regulations mandate that companies have certain security services. Lastly, to ensure good customer retention, companies must demonstrate an ability to use and protect customers’ personal information appropriately.
If you are a small or medium-sized business (SMB), finding and retaining a full-time employee with the skills needed to manage all aspects of cyber security for your business is hard. Many companies offer these services and are generally referred to as IT Security Service Providers or IT Security Consulting Services. Many managed IT services providers (MSPs) offer managed cyber security services as a service along with other IT managed services.
What are the Benefits of managed security services?
Managed cyber security services are simply the outsourcing of different security services to another company. Outsourcing can have several benefits depending on the type of company that you are, but here are some of the most important benefits of cyber security provided by an MSP like CG Technologies:
Expertise: Finding and securing good cyber security talent can be extremely difficult. Cyber Security is one of the few industries with almost zero unemployment; acquiring good talent is very competitive. Rather than spending valuable time and money trying to acquire them, hiring a company that retains that talent may be easier.
24/7 Coverage: By using a managed security service provider (MSSP), you can pay for 24/7 monitoring and coverage of your security operations. This can be much easier than finding sufficient in-house employees to cover a full 24/7 rotation.
Optimized Security Stack: Another critical aspect of a security program is acquiring security tools for your team. When you hire an MSSP, you get the benefit of leveraging their security stack rather than having to procure and manage these tools for yourself.
Less Overhead: Throughout your contract, you will have minimal responsibilities when it comes to configuration management. This means you spend less time worrying about tool configurations, tuning alert rules etc., and you can focus on the more critical elements of your business operations.
Managed Cyber Security Services from CG Technologies.
Cybersecurity services are critical for protecting your company against data breaches or ransomware. As discussed above, the goal of cyber security for your business can be summarized into three areas: confidentiality, integrity and availability. These goals are essential to help prevent or limit any financial loss, ensure your business complies with industry regulations and maintain customer confidence in your business.
For SMBs that don’t have the internal expertise and resources to manage security internally, CG Technologies can help. We have been providing managed IT security services for over 25 years. Download our small business ransomware protection guide or contact us to discuss your cyber security needs and how we can help protect your business.
