In the world of network security, zero-day vulnerabilities are becoming increasingly common and catastrophic at an alarming rate. As we discussed in our last blog, “zero-day” means that you have zero days to fix a newly discovered software vulnerability for which no patch or update has been released before it is exploited.
As we’ll cover in our final blog in this series, an incident response plan is critical to network security, but an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. In this post, we will discuss how attackers most commonly infiltrate your network and how best to prevent an attack.
How Network Security Gets Breached
If you watched the recent ransomware segment on HBO’s This Week Tonight, you know how expansive the problem of zero-day vulnerability truly is. The most frightening aspect of these attacks is that they can infiltrate your network and only the attackers know about the vulnerability until they choose to make their presence - and demands - known. But how do they get past your network security to exploit that vulnerability?
There are various ways that cybercriminals launch their attacks on zero-day vulnerabilities. Most often, once they have devised a method of exploiting an unpatched vulnerability, they infiltrate the network security of their victims using malware. As we learned in our series on ransomware, it is most commonly spread through phishing emails containing malicious attachments or links clicked on by unsuspecting users.
Protection Against Zero-Day Vulnerability Attacks
Zero-day attacks are a terrifying prospect, but there are several ways to help protect your business.
Security Awareness & Phishing Training
It only takes one naive user clicking on a suspicious link or trusting a phishing email to breach your network. Basic network security training and awareness of common attack methods for every employee mitigates your risk a great deal.
Continuous Threat & Vulnerability Management
Running continuous scans on your environment to identify anomalies in your normal operations goes a long way. All inconsistencies should be evaluated to determine whether or not they pose a risk to your business. These risks must then be communicated to you and a plan of action deployed to mitigate the threat or vulnerability.
SIEM Wave 3
SIEM Wave 3 is powered by MixMode and is the only solution on the market utilizing 3rd Wave Artificial Intelligence. This solution is self-supervised, context-aware, and predictive. This eliminates the need for IT teams to spend precious time deploying and re-configuring individual products and rules. RAVENii makes security event and log management easy and affordable with our managed SIEM Wave 3 Solution.
Managed Endpoint Protection
Managed endpoint protection ensures that the endpoints of security - the client devices - are protected against advanced threats. All access points should be monitored 24/7 for any malicious activity to protect your intellectual property, customer data, and reputation.
All of these services and more are available from RAVENii. For more information about network security and incident response services from RAVENii, click here or call (844)317-0944 today.