A recent survey found that 88% of IT professionals considered endpoint management an essential part of technology strategy, while almost a third didn’t know how many endpoints they had. This is largely down to the fact that the number of endpoints in the typical business environment has increased exponentially in recent years. No longer do administrators have to focus solely on servers, workstations, and point-of-sale devices; they also have to factor in mobile and IoT devices — all of which pose a serious threat to your organisation. If you haven’t already installed endpoint security solutions for your business, here are six more reasons why you should.
#1. Protect against insider threat
Most data breaches stem from insider threat, whether that takes the form of employee negligence or rogue personnel. Since endpoints are potential entry points to your corporate network, a single misclick on an unsecured device can easily lead to a much larger security breach. To mitigate insider threat, endpoints need to be protected by anti-malware, access control, automatic lock screens, and constant monitoring. It’s also wise to disable any feature that increase your exposure to risk, such as Bluetooth.
#2. Lock down isolated vulnerabilities
Installing malware on a single machine that isn’t adequately protected is all it takes to compromise an entire network. In fact, one of the biggest data breaches was caused by installing malware on a point-of-sale system. Endpoint protection helps you close potential vulnerabilities on individual devices connected to your network. If those protections are disabled for whatever reason, the system should automatically prevent them from having access to the network, too.
#3. Stop the spread of malware
Any device with digital storage can host malware, and any firmware. Operating systems can be compromised by viruses, worms, Trojans and ransomware. As such, it’s important to have anti-malware solutions that provide heuristic scanning, round-the-clock monitoring, and centralised access control to protect you from a wide array of attacks.
#4. Safeguard mobile devices
It’s hard to imagine a modern business trying to operate without mobile technology, but there’s also no denying that the convenience of smartphones and tablets also make them vulnerable to loss or theft. It’s critical that endpoint security is extended to all portable devices connected to the network, and that you have a way to remotely wipe them if they go astray. Better yet, keep everything on a secure centralised server or cloud storage facility and avoid storing any sensitive data to mitigate the risk of data breaches.
#5. Prevent problems before they happen
The limitation of conventional antivirus software is that it’s a reactive measure that only kicks in once an endpoint has already been infected. Although the software might help prevent further damage, it’s a situation that you really want to avoid in the first place. A proactive approach to digital security requires additional layers of security, such as web intrusion detection and prevention, and web filtering. Since your endpoints and their users are on the frontlines of your information security, it’s critical that you take every necessary step to prevent incidents from occurring in the first place.
#6. Maintain full audit trails
If a data breach does occur, industry regulations like HIPAA and PCI DSS require businesses to prove that they’ve taken every necessary step to prevent and mitigate them. By maintaining a complete audit of how the attack occurred, administrators will also be able to pinpoint the vulnerability and lock it down against future attacks. Cloud-hosted endpoint security software records all activities to maintain a complete and unmodifiable log that can be used to assess the maturity of your information security.
Austin Technology provides unlimited IT support and solutions to organisations in Perth. Call us today to keep your devices out of harm’s way.
