The Biggest Cybersecurity Threats Aren’t Famous

In the world of network security protection, controls, and solutions, the cyber-attacks and cyber criminals grab the headlines. It’s as if we’ve all stepped out of a time machine into the 1930s, when Dillinger, Capone, and the rest captured the public imagination, even while doing great harm. The mind loves a story, and a story with heroes and villains sticks.

It’s ironic, then, that the greatest unguarded threat is visible, and the most numerous human sources of data and IT network threat are people to whom we issue a paycheck. Because real-world studies show that even the most disciplined associates see data ports and connections as perfectly innocent places to hook up a personal device – even a USB memory stick they might have found on the floor, or in the parking lot. The studies are sobering.

Trends toward mobility and bring-your-own-device (BYOD) operations in the workplace accentuate this thread even further. The “wall-building” approach to network security protection, controls, and solutions fails utterly to address the real threat from within.

The data ports and cable connections of your data and IT network offer the easiest, most numerous points of access for data theft, compromise, and infection. At The Connectivity Center, we provide companies, agencies, and enterprises of all kinds an enormous selection of devices for controlling access to your data network, securing these visible points of entry, and giving you the network security protection, controls, and solutions you need today.

What Experts Recommend

A recent industry study concluded that focus is a key element to effective network security protection, controls, and solutions. It was found that a company with five cyber-security suppliers was 30% more likely to be hacked or infected. And a large company with 50 or more suppliers was 80% more vulnerable. Yes, the fact that any company would use so many suppliers points to the uncertainty – even desperation – that data-dependent operations feel today. Yet evidently, the simpler your approach to network security protection, controls, and solutions, the better.

The very first and most fundamental finding of this industry report is that controlling access to the system is basic, the thing to do before, after, and during everything else in  network security protection, controls, and solutions. The seemingly simple step of access control is so difficult, though, that it’s been given an industry-jargon acronym, NAC, for network access control. The idea is simple; not everyone should have access to your network. The real world is complex and difficult. Without access, no work gets done. Passwords and PINs and questions about your maternal grandmother’s middle name bedevil the widely accepted world of digital communication and commerce. Yet, the headlines still reek with dashing-sounding names for malware and viruses.

Network access control begins with what you can see. Your ports and connectors. They are essential tools, surely, but like any sharp tool they call for extreme care in handling. Even authorized users are huge sources of compromise to network security, protection, controls, and solutions. Just syncing their smartphone, or using a memory stick to take work home, can introduce goodness knows what from anywhere on the vast, virtually infinite Web. It’s as simple and innocent as that. That’s why the USB port blockers, network port locks, fiber optic port locks, computer cables, and the other devices you’ll find at The Connectivity Center are basic to NAC – network access control.

Strengthening the Perimeter

Antivirus and antimalware software is available elsewhere. We’ll help you locate a good fit, because the whole perimeter of network security protection, controls, and solutions is our concern. Making that perimeter complete is our business. If you stop the viruses, ransomware, Trojans, worms, and spyware from getting in through visible ports and connections, then a broad sector of your security perimeter is secured, and the software that continually seeks anomalies and fixes damage has a better chance to be effective.

In fact, all the other measures that constitute the current state of the art in network security protection, controls, and solutions do better when you secure the physical access to your network. Application security, data loss prevention, and behavioral analytics are important measures, especially when you work through the cloud. And again, they all work better when you secure the visible access first and foremost.

Did you know that the Smart Keeper series of blocks, locks, and links from The Connectivity Center – including Link Lock connectors and the Link Lock Hub – can positively secure those access points, and still permit access by the associates who are truly authorized to use them?

The Skinny on Network Security Protection, Controls, and Solutions

Servers and applications get a lot of the attention that executives devote to network security protection, controls, and solutions. But with cloud computing came a virtually infinite expansion in the source of threats. And mobile computing and communicating devices add further dynamic complexity to the threat environment.

The fact that legions of proficient technicians are at work everywhere, doing their best to stay abreast of this existential threat that faces enterprises today, should give us some measure of confidence. But the threat to network security protection, controls, and solutions will remain dynamic, a living part of business from this day forward. And oddly, the more resources we devote to addressing it, the more we realize how complex the threat can be.

This is all the more reason to make sure you’re not leaving the front door open, as your specialists and contractors run from window to window looking for threats.

The access you must have to operate and populate your IT and data networks includes – and begins with – the ports and connections your people use every day. This is the front door, and it is astonishing how often it is unsecured. We can help.