Has your organization's tech stack kept pace with today's evolving cybersecurity landscape? Like a fortress protecting against invaders, you should build your organization's tech stack with layered security in mind. One gap in defense can be all a hacker needs to infiltrate your corporate infrastructure.
Layered cybersecurity, often called defense in depth, involves implementing multiple security measures to protect systems and data. Each layer is a barrier an attacker must breach before accessing sensitive information or compromising a system. No security measure is foolproof, so layered security aims to create a multi-faceted defense strategy that can withstand various attack vectors.
Fortifying your tech stack against today's cyberattacks is a multi-step process involving auditing your current setup, researching how to fill gaps, and executing improvements so that multiple layers of security are in place at all levels of the organization to protect every entry point to the business.
Audit
Your organization's tech stack has likely grown over time. When did you last complete a full audit of every technology in use across the organization, both hardware and software? The audit should account for everything from routers, servers, and devices to third-party SaaS and web apps.
What technology powers your organization's daily operations? What data does your organization use and store? How do employees work daily, including the devices, networks, and digital services that power their productivity? Does your company's tech stack address all five areas of the
NIST Cybersecurity Framework - identify, protect, detect, respond, and recover?
Taking the time to gain as complete a picture as possible will help you identify what needs protection and how it's currently protected. When doing a full audit, you can see what's working from a cybersecurity perspective and where there are gaps. How would common threats potentially impact the company, and are they being addressed? If not, what needs to be added or changed? Which entry points lack protection? If one security measure fails, what else is in place to slow down or stop an attack? How will the company respond once an attacker breaches the so-called perimeter?
With a completed audit, an organization can decide whether to phase out technology that has outgrown its usefulness while exploring new or supplemental technologies to add more protective layers to its tech stack.
Research
Armed with the knowledge of existing cybersecurity gaps, you can research how to address them. Determining which security technologies are best for your organization may be influenced by the company size, industry, geography, type of data used or stored, and relevant regulations. Whether addressing the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe or the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) in healthcare, expanding your tech stack can create layered security while being tailored to meet specific compliance needs.
Your organization's needs can be highly individualized, so leaders across the organization - including finance, legal, security, and IT - must participate in the research phase to some degree. Cybersecurity affects - and is affected by - every aspect of a business. When researching new security technologies, it's critical to understand the internal and external factors impacting the company. Your goal is for any changes to the tech stack to be effective, from both a security and operational perspective. Often, adoption by end users and support from business leaders is also critical to the success of new security programs. With input early on in the process from leaders across the organization, you're more likely to make well-received decisions and implement security technology with high employee adoption rates.
Execute
So, you've identified the security gaps in your tech stack and researched how to address them, and your organization is ready to move forward. Whether you're subtracting from your existing tech stack or, more likely, expanding it to include new services, a layered security approach covers a broad spectrum of potential vulnerabilities and increases the chances of identifying and mitigating threats effectively. To do that, you need to lock down access to every entry point, with multiple security factors that work to reduce risk.
Many companies reach for Multifactor Authentication (MFA) and Single Sign-On (SSO) to address the security of access points. By requiring additional data to prove a user's identity, MFA significantly reduces the risk of credential-based attacks like phishing. SSO also helps to eliminate credential-based threats like phishing by reducing the number of passwords in use and replacing password-based logins with more robust authentication protocols.
While MFA and SSO can be critical layers to your tech stack, they can also leave risky gaps. Many web apps are unsupported by SSO protocols and MFA, while the prevalence of Shadow IT leads to unprotected logins across the organization. When executing improvements to your tech stack, a password manager - and, by extension, passwordless login - can close the gaps left by other authentication technologies. Combining the security advantages of MFA with the frictionless experience of passwordless logins, a password manager like LastPass brings a universal solution to the "password problem" in your tech stack.
Build a culture of cybersecurity
Beyond the tech stack, an organization should focus on implementing corporate policies that support
a strong culture of cybersecurity. The human element remains one of the weakest links in cybersecurity, and every user interacting with an organization's systems is a part of its cybersecurity defense strategy.
User education and awareness campaigns are paramount. When employees can recognize and respond to potential threats, they can be part of the solution in reducing successful cyber attacks. A culture of cybersecurity means building security into every tech decision at the organizational level and daily operations at the employee level. It's also part of the everyday attitudes and actions of employees and decision-makers at every functional level of the organization.
Organizations and individuals can create a robust defense against various threats by implementing layered cybersecurity. This approach strengthens security and provides redundancy, early detection, compliance, and resilience. Ultimately, layered cybersecurity is an investment in protecting sensitive data, maintaining trust with customers, and safeguarding the integrity of digital systems. In an era where cyberattacks are a matter of "when" rather than "if," embracing a layered cybersecurity strategy is a proactive and essential step toward a more secure digital future.
Contact us today to learn more about how LastPass can complement your tech stack.
