The 3 most important words in cybersecurity

Cybersecurity has slowly grown higher in importance, both with businesses and customers. Cyber crime damages set to cost the world $6 trillion annually by 2021 according to Cybersecurity Ventures, so it’s clear why it’s such an important subject globally.

A breach not only hits you in the pocket, with loss of sales and any fines you face. It can also affect your reputation. Ensuring your systems are secure and having the technology to detect and respond is an important part of building trust with your customers. Without that trust and peace of mind that their data is secure, you’re likely to damage important customer relationships along the way.

With 98 percent of businesses relying on digital communication or services which exposes you to risks, you need to ensure you’re protected and know how to detect and respond to any threats.

But if you have laptops, mobiles, and hundreds of other devices – including personal ones, ensuring strong security can seem like an impossible task, right? How can you make sure all these devices are secure without your IT team spending 100 percent of their time managing this?

Security by default; not just an add-on

One of the easiest ways is to look for products and services that are built with security in mind. This not only ensures you’re secure, but also works in and across your whole digital infrastructure. It even stretches into the third parties you work with.

In fact, the NCSC recommends that technology be secure by default. This innovative way of thinking treats security problems at the root cause, instead of adding them on later to treat the symptoms. By adopting this approach and ensuring the security adapts and updates to new threats; products and services that have built-in security tend to have better usability. Not only does this mean it’s secure, but it’s easy to adopt and be productive in the long-term.

It’s no longer important just to build ‘stronger walls’. You don’t just need to protect against risks; you also need to be able to detect and respond quickly to them.

1. Protect

Don’t just wait for an attack to happen, assume it will and act proactively. Ensure you have the protections you need. By having built-in security, you can ensure all devices across your digital estate have the same level of protection and compliance.

Take an ‘assume breach’ approach and protect data through identity and access management tools. Not only does this automatically prevent those who shouldn’t see sensitive information from ever seeing it, but it helps your employees work on and off-site, and even lets you share documents with third-parties.

2. Detect

Did you know hackers spend on average 200 days inside a system before they’re detected? That’s over six months spent with you and your customer’s data. Which is why you need to ensure you have security that can detect cyber breaches and their evolving tactics in real-time.

Use analytics-based detection to leverage insights of new and daily threats. It can also automatically take appropriate prevention action to stop any breach in its tracks before it occurs. Microsoft’s built-in security benefits from drawing threat intelligence from all points in its and its partners technology chain, globally and across industries. Meaning it provides an unparalleled view of the threat landscape.

3. Respond

Microsoft’s security and cloud technologies have built-in intelligence and work together to report malicious data threats as they occur. This provides a record that helps us diagnose attacks, reverse engineer advanced threat techniques, and apply this intelligence across all platforms.

This means that your technology is working to quickly detect and block cyberthreats and safeguard your data using advanced analytics, freeing up time for you to get on while your work.

Manage your whole digital estate

Built-in security provides native solutions that work together to deliver coordinated protection and remediation to maximise security. This means it’s easier for you to manage your whole digital estate, collaborate with third-parties, and ensure your whole organisation remains secure. All while staying productive and focussing on your business value.

Find out more

Microsoft Security – the team you never knew you had 

7 tips to rethink your security

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About the author

Nick is passionate about transforming every person and organisation to be more productive and more secure in his role as Security Product Marketing Lead within the Microsoft modern workplace team. A geek at heart, he spends his spare time experimenting with lasers and 3D printers with his two sons, keeping old computers alive (particularly Commodores), and learning about mechanics to keep an ageing British sports car on the road.