Cyber security protects various hardware, software, networks, computers and other devices from cyber threats. It can be applied on any level such as corporate, governmental or personal devices or networks.  This article talks about cybersecurity strategies that are critical for any organization with highly sensitive data. A number of industries now hire a Chief Information Security Officer to manage their cybersecurity. Following are the most common cybersecurity tools studied in this article: Firewalls, Software patches, Anti-virus, Anti-malware software and more. The benefits that an organizations can reap through a well-designed cyber security are also discussed in this paper.&nbs

Cyber security protects various hardware, software, networks, computers and other devices from cyber threats. It can be applied on any level such as corporate, governmental or personal devices or networks.  This article talks about cybersecurity strategies that are critical for any organization with highly sensitive data. A number of industries now hire a Chief Information Security Officer to manage their cybersecurity. Following are the most common cybersecurity tools studied in this article: Firewalls, Software patches, Anti-virus, Anti-malware software and more. The benefits that an organizations can reap through a well-designed cyber security are also discussed in this paper. 

Why is cyber security important?

Cyber security is the process of defending or protecting sensitive or personal information from cyber-attacks. It is the most significant part for number of sectors such as government, military, financial, and medical as they collect, process, and store huge amount of information on their storage devices. This data could encompass sensitive information such as personal information, intellectual data, or financial data for which illegal access may have a negative impact.   Several organizations also need to transmit sensitive information across devices or networks. For such incidence, cyber security works as a firewall, which defends that information and devices used to process or store it. Rising cyber-attacks over businesses or organizations, especially those which are tasked with guarding information linking to national security, healthcare, or financial records, must take steps ahead to protect their personal and sensitive information.

Approaches to Cyber Security

• People

In an organization, each employee requires to be aware of their role in reducing and preventing cyber-attacks , and dedicated technical cyber security team needs to stay updated with the recent skills and qualifications to respond and mitigate to cyber threats.

• Processes

Processes are essential in describing how the company’s activities, documentations, and roles are used to ease the risks to the organization’s information. Cyber breaches change quickly, so processes require to be repeatedly reviewed to be able to adapt along with them.

• Technology

By recognizing the cyber threats that an organization is infected with, one should start to find what technologies one will need to stop such threats.  Technology can be deployed to reduce or prevent the impact of cyber-attacks.

What Cyber security can protect?

Cyber security can help to identity thefts, cyber-attacks, and data breaches and can help in risk management.

If an organization has a strong knowledge of network security, it is better able to mitigate and prevent such attacks. For ex. end user protection guards information and protects against theft while scanning computers.

Challenges in Cyber Security

For efficient cyber security solution, an organization must coordinate its all efforts throughout its overall information system.  Following are some elements of cyber security:

• Application security
• Network security
• Data Security
• Endpoint security
• Database & infrastructure security
• Identity management
• Mobile security
• Cloud security
• End-user education
• Disaster recovery

Traditionally, many organizations and government have mostly concentrated on their cyber security resources to defend their most important system components and protect against known threats. But, nowadays this approach is insufficient, because of the increased threats. As a result, a number of advisory organizations promote more adaptive and proactive approaches to cyber security. Furthermore, the NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) issued regulations in its risk management framework recommend a move toward real-time assessments and continuous monitoring, to increase security as compared to the traditional perimeter-based approach.

Cyber security threats

• Phishing

Phishing attacks are continually growing day by day. It is often caused by text messages, phone calls or genuine mails, these threats can inflict huge damage organizations.

• Ransomware

Ransomware is one of the fastest rising form of cyber-attack.  It is a type of malware which demands payment after encoding the victim’s files.

• Malware

Malware is used to define any programme or file intended to damage a computer, and includes worms, trojans, viruses, social engineering, and spyware.

• Social Engineering

Social Engineering term is used to manipulate and deceive victims to improve computer access. This type of threats can be achieved by deceiving users into clicking harmful links.

• Outdated Software

The use of outdated software such as Microsoft XP growing opportunities for cyber criminals to take benefit of known exposures which can bring the entire system down.

Most Common Causes of Cyber Threats

• Industrial spies
• National governments or nation states
• Terrorists
• Hacktivists and hackers
• Organized crime groups
• Disgruntled insiders
• Business competitors

Why Cyber Threat Intelligence is Necessary for Organizations?

Advanced threat criminals such as organized cybercriminals, nation-states and cyber espionage criminals represent the largest information security threat to organizations today. Number of organization struggle to detect such cyber threats due to their stealthy nature, resource sophistication and their “Low & slow” approach. For organizations, these more organized, sophisticated and persistent threat criminals are seen only through the digital traces. For such reasons, organizations need visibility out of their network boundaries into advanced threats precisely targeting their management and infrastructure. This is called as threat intelligence.

Cyber-attack researchers can initiate by identifying background profile of resources beyond the network boundaries and being aware of offline cyber threats. They should continuously monitor domain names, IP addresses, and IP addresses ranges. With such advanced visibility, you can improved awareness of identification of threats, ongoing exploits, and the cyber criminals behind them.  This let you to take proactive stages to protect these cyber threats with proper response.