Attacks on your network will be happening continuously on a 24/7/365 basis – attacks cause a range of issues from simple nuisance issues through to slowing your network performance and functionality and all the way through to causing your network and even worse, your data, to be lost or corrupted.

Attacks on your network are not just through email containing malicious code and attachments being sent to staff, or by simple web browsing and visiting sites which cause malware, viruses and Trojans to be downloaded – your network is exposed at any point where users (both authorized and non-authorized) can gain access to the network or wherever the network is connected to the outside world and particularly at the web gateway.

Security issues are very real and the losses which may be caused by attacks come with a huge financial price tag. The damage is not just to your bottom line but also to your assets, and particularly your business reputation. How many customers will be happy to learn that because your network security was breached, their private banking and personal information has been stolen or lost? What do you think a business regulator is going to make of your inability to produce financial records when they ask for them? How about an inability to produce email correspondence if you are engaged in a legal dispute?

Wireless connectivity is increasing and becoming an industry standard for accessing networks and the internet as well as being able to work remotely over the web. This means that there is a never ending variety of opportunities to gain access to the network by breaking in through the wireless gateway or by taking control of a remotely-linked machine.

One solution is to strengthen application security. Application security deals with the software programs which your staff are using and security solutions need to be put in place in order to ensure that hardware they are using cannot be compromised by non-authorized parties and also, that when they are running a program it only performs authorized tasks. For instance, an employee loses a laptop through theft – the laptop must not then be allowed to access the network remotely which can be achieved by using machine access codes, strong password policies to use an application and to access the network.

Another solution is to ensure that WiFi security is strengthened. Try this yourself, in your neighborhood, whether at work or at home, ask your computer to show you existing wireless networks (if you’re running Windows you can usually see an icon in your bottom taskbar on the right hand side). If there are wireless networks in the area, it will show you whether they are secured or unsecured. If you see an unsecured network, which is likely, you will be able to hop onto the internet using that connection and wireless router. Effectively this is stealing someone’s bandwidth but more importantly, it is allowing a third-party to come closer to gaining access to the network core, your data and your hardware.

By: Lawrence Reaves