Corporate network safety

Where do the dreams lead?

From the beginning of IT-infrastructure development employees hoped for work relief and idleness and company founders- for efficiency increase, cost reduce and profit increase due to investments in technologies. At the same time IT-companies tried fully satisfy enterprises expectations and needs. Revolutionary transfer from processing centers to personal computers and back define demands to information-analytic structures of the company and though majority of the computers are still personal, information determines its requirements. It is became clear long ago that in order to answer all demands of all employees and business owners, company IT-structure has to meet several requirements connected with data exchange, storage and access.

 

It is necessary to mentions that a lot is achieved. Internet, information consolidation in united data processing centers, information accessibility, comfortable and manageable network infrastructure, users’ mobility, systems on united communications and data exchange make business more efficient, economical, comfortable and fast. Enterprises and technologies try to meet modern market demands and growing customer needs. But users are regular people, and people are different, and in our country very often only money can turn regular person into a gentlemen, everybody makes money considering their ability, moral foundations and delicate emotional pattern. And at this point we come across the question of corporate network safety and data protection.

 

Unfortunately a matter of income receiving drives not only businesses but also cyber criminality. Together with IT improvement attack technologies improve. If at the beginning hackers and virus writers attacks were aimed at showing off, having fun, use safety knowledge practically or fight with big companies, now safety solutions fight cyber criminality, which wants to make money.

External Threads

Hacker attacks, viruses, spam, spyware, and other malware lately became highly technological and unique:

 

·         For the last two years number of unique malware has increased 15 times;

·         Ways of writing, penetration and concealment of all malware kinds, combined and polymorphous viruses have grown;

·         The most dangerous and active are threads and attacks connected with using Internet;

·         Attacks became more considered and unique, aimed at specific network;

·         Social engineering helps to use hasty users action to get in networks;

 

Corporate network protection is possible only by complex solution and preventive defence measures development

Malware Protection Solutions

Described above situation leads to situation where traditional methods, where every sample of malware is analyzed and update antivirus software is released could not deal with such samples number growth and infection methods. As a result there is a need for a complex, multilevel protection system, which could ensure earliest possible threats blocking, before hitting the network and prevent vulnerability. There is a need to manage big amount of vulnerabilities and protect from unknown threats.

 

As a result while choosing solution you should head for big players of safety market, which have necessary resources and share to grow in new conditions.  There is a need to direct efforts to preventive protection technologies similar to “protection in the cloud” technology, network reputation services, behavior analysis and company protection strategy. Malware protection solutions have to correspond with more difficult demands than before, especially from administration point of view, so that IT-departments don’t constantly work on vulnerability of corporate network and could secure information protection during all its movement stages and on all network units, ensuring:

 

• Threat, attacks and data theft attempts from Internet were blocked at the system entry;
• Administer users access to the Internet and block unwanted URL addresses;
• Automated detection of network and applications vulnerabilities, preventing using them in harmful way;
• Administer safety rules, exceptions and policies;
• Complex defence of corporate e-mail from any threats connected with it operability;
• Active defence of all work stations in a corporate network, including devices that work over remote access or occasionally are outside the corporate network;
• Corporate server protection;
• United administration of defence system on all levels, monitoring methods and preventing measures and antivirus protection administration;
• Automated system reconstruction in case of infecting;

 

And of course system has to meet demands of scalability, low cost of ownership and do not result in immense grows of IT-department stuff, as efficiency and effectiveness remain immediate demand to company economical activity.

Network Protection

All corporate networks, regardless of size, will win assuring complex content protection from growing number of threats and considering constant perimeter change and network resources. Today corporate network perimeters widen due to internal wireless connections, remote access of mobile users, and also porting inner corporate partner networks and setting connections between all possible access points inside a network. Companies use more and more applications and software, like voice transmitting over IP-protocol and instant messaging. Safety systems have to include all possibilities for protection granted by separate highly tailored safety components- antivirus software, firewalls and IPS. Potential of highly tailored solutions, such as firewalls and antivirus software, is not enough to counteract modern compound type attacks. Separate components of defence system are not able deeply analyze data clusters, assemble content and monitor contents on applications level. While in modern business conditions it is very important to solve these tasks without braking information system integrity and interrupting work of applications in the network. As a result only complex solutions can assure dynamic protection of corporate network from many different threats and intrusions.

 

Software-hardware complexes assure highly reliable network and content protection and secure corporate network work in a real-time mode. Such systems have to be well planned, scalable, and easy to mange solutions, which would provide the best means, including content filter, firewall, intrusion protection, and VPN building and support and traffic format:

 

• Firewall monitors all through-passing content, secures highest possible carrying capacity and foresees scalability potential. As a rule firewalls protect inner computer networks from outer intrusion but it is also important that firewall could be adjusted to control outgoing traffic and provide high processing power up to several tens of gigabit.
• Intrusion-prevention systems notify about intrusion risk, using adjustable database, which include big amount of known signatures and heuristic analyzers that widen detection modules and prevent new threat spread in a real time mode, prevent the most destructive attacks on a perimeter level of wired or wireless network, partner network or on the level of subsidiary connection to the corporate network.
• Standard VPN-networks support, which works with IPSec-, SSL-TLS-, PPTP- and L2TP protocols makes connection channels between networks and clients protected. Due to dedicated IS capabilities data rate over VPN-network increases and companies can safely use Internet as public platform. Support of variety of dedicated protocols secures reliable private connection over Internet. VPN-Client defines users, encode data and administrate connection session.
• Traffic composition function help users control network traffic to optimize efficiency, decrease waiting time and ensure the best bandwidth parameters. Because network bandwidth has restrictions, traffic composition allows companies to determine priority directions and administer highly expensive network services. At rational management traffic composition function setting decreases waiting time in the network, secures network services access and allows use bandwidth optimal without fails due to load decrease.

 

Big corporations, institutions, subsidiaries and small companies need security solutions, which are ready to be directly used, in turnkey solutions. That is why system has to launch relatively easily and ensure high security and reliability level. Hardware-software systems have to possess important strategic aspect, which is not only the part of security system, but also has economical ground while choosing solution- unitized administration and monitoring system. It helps to minimize work size needed for launching, configuring, monitoring and servicing of the system and increase TCO. That is why among main advantages of the security systems are:

• Unitized administrative console for designating politics, reconsidering/correcting of the configuring operation factors;
• Ability to review security events and system events using unitized interface;
• Productivity and integration with centralized report system and with centralized control system;
• Ability to restrict access rights including the one based on the functions distribution;

Internal Threads

Company IT-structure is similar to a castle, which should be able to repulse periodical intrusion attempts from outside and at the same time resist attempts to implement “send out warriors” system, which tries to incapacitate form the inside, and “send out spies” system finding out secrets for interested opponent side. It means threats to company information security are not limited to external intrusions attempts but are divided into internal and external threats. On the diagram you can see the ratio of internal and external threats at the present time according to independent researches:

 

Rating of the most dangerous threats based on the Info Watch company researches:

 

 

As you can see internal threats- information sabotage, data theft and employees inaccurate actions lead to big losses connected with informational security violation and caused by confidential information leak, suffered inside the company.

Threats from employees actions could not be fully prevented, but could be manageable and minimized. During designating full-scale information security system all possible methods of internal attacks commitment and ways of information leakage should be taken into consideration. Protection systems that can ensure control over the information that pass through every network node and block all attempts of unauthorized access to confidential data are needed.

For staying protected company has to design system in a way that every process should be monitored and controlled, clear understanding of what should be protected, knowledge of appropriate threats and ability to prevent them is needed. Technically leakage could happen by many channels: mail transfer agent, open mail systems, instant messaging, printers and data drives- compact disks, mobile devises with flesh memory and built in hard drive. On the whole protection of every single work station and information system should meet two main characteristics: disconnection of excess services for users and constant situation monitoring in active services. It is sufficiently difficult to balance out these two characteristics during system planning, but this is the only way to create clear and flexible security system, equally effective from internal and external threats.

Information systems attacks bring huge damage, not only financial. If company does not attempt to ensure information security it can result in trust losses, reputation undermine, company cost increase, fees and charges for management.

 

Information security exceeds the bounds of risk management process now it is basic business component.

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Specialists of our company have all the necessary resources, solutions and qualification for professional and effective implementation of various difficulty level projects for companies of all sizes.

For any additional information please call +380 (44) 323-23-23, or write e-mails.