3 Lesser Known Ways to Protect Your Business from Cyber Threats

As you know, cyber threats are becoming more sophisticated and common. Staying one step ahead may feel like constantly introducing new security measures or revising existing ones, but prevention is always better than a cure. 

Today, we’ll share three ways to shore up your business defences you might not have considered. Instead of just focusing on external security risks, we’ll explore internal risks too — from accidental data sharing to intentional sabotage by a disgruntled employee.

Reinforce Your Cyber Security Using These Underappreciated Methods

Firstly, Human Error

When we think about cybersecurity we imagine hackers in far-flung places. But the biggest threats are often right under our noses, chatting with us and wearing matching lanyards. 

Human error is one of the most common reasons for breaches and why social engineering attacks continue to be so effective after decades. Bad actors don’t even interact with your system, they manipulate individuals instead. Cyber criminals simply send phishing emails or call pretending to be Ash from HR or Daniel from IT.  

To avoid these risks, prioritise employee training. Help employees understand risk, appreciate mistakes happen, and spot potential issues. Recommend and encourage extra caution and checks (we can share plenty of cautionary industry tales and tips to help) and nurture an open culture. Employees should feel comfortable reporting security issues or their own mistakes without fearing the repercussions. This can similarly avoid another security risk from disgruntled or ex-employees.

Even the best cybersecurity protection can fail if we ignore the human factor and internal threats, intentional or not.

Secondly, Trust No One – The Only Advice for Cybersecurity

This is the core belief to the Zero Trust security strategy. Unlike other models, it doesn’t assume trust for anyone, including existing users. It’s a proactive approach which limits access to data, networks or resources for everyone (and everything), internally and externally. It demands continuous verification for every transaction within all digital estate layers.

Microsoft offers various products and protections built upon the Zero Trust model, across the Microsoft 365 and Azure suites, including Microsoft Sentinel, Azure Defender, Azure Firewall, Web Application Firewall, to name a few.

You can implement Zero Trust security for your business by following the three core principles and choosing the most relevant technologies below: 

1. Verify explicitly. Always validate and authorise based on all available data points. Use as many attributes as possible when granting or denying access. For instance, location, endpoint, device, workload, etc. The multi-factor and continuous verification help to minimise the risk of each user gaining access to sensitive data they shouldn’t. You can boost your verification processes and criteria using Azure AD Conditional Access, Privileged Identity Management and Just-In-Time (JIT) access technologies from Microsoft.

2. Use least privilege access. Limit user access with Just-In-Time (JIT) and Just-Enough-Access (JEA), risk-based adaptive policies, and data protection. Essentially, it only gives people the necessary to do their jobs, not more. The key is to apply it across all levels, like on-premises infrastructure, endpoints, and Windows workstations. You can control this granular level of permissions using role-based access control (RBAC) within Azure and the broader Microsoft cloud stack. 
3. Assume breach. Segment access to minimise destruction. By appreciating that all defences eventually fail, you can reduce a failure’s impact. Think of it like the blast doors or flood defences. By segmenting a network, you can effectively box in an attacker and prevent lateral damage.  

Limit the damage by verifying end-to-end encryption and using analytics to see threats, drive threat detection, and improve defences. You can limit or segment through Azure network access control and use Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence for analysis.

Thirdly: Microsoft Copilot for Security

Copilot for Security is a handy piece of kit that not enough users are aware of. It works alongside existing security measures and uses AI to analyse device information, provide access policy insights, identify user risk, and help you avoid breaches—all with built-in prompts in the user interface. 

Ways you can use it: 

1. Incident response. Time is of the essence with cybersecurity incidents. Copilot for Security summarises incident information, assesses impact and provides guidance in near real-time. Crucial for a quick resolution.
2. Security posture management. Copilot for Security gathers crucial information about emerging or known threats and recommends one or more ways to strengthen your security or minimise your risk exposure.
3. Script analysis. Use Copilot to review risky scripts to determine whether they are malicious or benign. It can spot the metaphorical wolf in sheep’s clothing. Even if you or your analysts aren’t familiar with the coded language, Copilot helps you understand so you can act accordingly. 

It’s available as a standalone app or integrates with other Microsoft security products, such as Defender XDR, Sentinel, Intune, Defender Threat Intelligence, Entra, Purview, etc.

Our Comprehensive Cybersecurity Support

So, there you have it – 3 underappreciated ways to form a solid cybersecurity defence. Adopting a proactive approach—externally and internally—will minimise your customers’ vulnerabilities and mitigate exposure to cybersecurity threats.

Want to talk to us about Cybersecurity solutions? Our Azure team are happy and on hand to offer further advice on how to secure your virtual premises. Contact our expert team at azure@westcoastcloud.co.uk today.

Written by Peter Hodgkinson, Azure Business Support Specialist at Westcoast Cloud.