Government and healthcare organizations have copious amounts of personal data and account information that they are responsible for safeguarding. The abundance of valuable information public sector organizations have lures cybercriminals who wish to exploit this data for identity theft, financial fraud and more. Taking a proactive approach to cybersecurity is key for public sector organizations to mitigate risk.
As the threat landscape becomes more persistent, sophisticated, and costly, public sector organizations need to take steps to reinforce their defense. Strong security frameworks are important in building more secure environments, but it’s proactive cyber processes, systems and tools that ultimately keep attackers at bay.
What is a proactive approach to cybersecurity?
Exposure to security breaches is not an option when you work with highly sensitive data like passwords and Social Security Numbers. For many organizations, mitigating the risk of a breach is, or should be the top priority.
A proactive approach to cybersecurity involves identifying and correcting risks before they can be exploited by attackers. Therefore, the goal is to detect quicker in order to make remediations and mitigate risk faster.
An effective proactive cybersecurity strategy prioritizes constant monitoring of the organization’s technology infrastructure, allowing you to mitigate risk.
Best Practices for a Proactive Cybersecurity Program
- Prioritize active threat hunting to detect users with unauthorized access.
- Complete regular penetration tests to assess and adjust for vulnerabilities in your systems.
- Utilize proactive endpoint monitoring to track and control all endpoints in your network and prevent disruptions.
- Provide your staff with security awareness training to reduce the risk of phishing and malware attacks.
- Ensure your security program outputs are optimized to help you reach your goal.
Microsoft Sentinel: Proactive Cybersecurity by Design
Microsoft Azure Sentinel is one of the first cloud-native security information and event managers (SIEM). The Sentinel platform uses built-in AI to analyze large quantities of data across an enterprise quickly.
Sentinel is designed to detect threat anomalies. Unlike other cloud-based SIEM programs, Sentinel has built-in security orchestration automated response (SOAR) and user and entity behavior analytics (UEBA) services. These native components expedite your security team’s incident detection and event response processes.
With Sentinel, Microsoft Security customers are constantly receiving more information and outputs when compared to other platforms. With so much information coming from one platform, you can choose to leverage specific data to help you reach your security goals. Plus, with Microsoft’s fully integrated design, there are no silos for attackers to hide behind. This means you can detect attacks anywhere in your system and respond faster.
Get Strategic Outputs with Difenda
A proactive approach is not exclusively about software. There are people and processes that drive your security system, and they need access to the right information at the right time to effectively mitigate risk.
With all the systems and tools built right into Microsoft Sentinel, Difenda filters through and finds what matters most for your organization. We align security-specific frameworks and expertise and power it through outputs of Microsoft Sentinel.
We know that to be successful, you need access to the most important data, fast. Difenda takes an outcome-driven approach to customize and be specific with your outputs within Microsoft Sentinel. Difenda leverages Sentinel’s automation orchestration capabilities to prioritize and remediate anomalies fast. We help you strategically prioritize outputs based on your goals and respond to threats effectively.
As cyberattacks increase in number and sophistication, the public sector must take responsibility for securing critical data and infrastructure. Placing security first is essential as the threat landscape becomes more aggressive. Only proactive security systems, like Difenda and Microsoft Sentinel, will provide the intelligence and support needed to tackle these complex cyber threats.
