A Balanced Approach To Cybersecurity Risk Mitigation

By Jeff Jackson, President, Summit Computer Services, Member of The ASCII Group since 2017

Technology is essential to mitigate the risk of exposure to cyberattack.  Note that mitigate means to reduce or lessen in severity, not preclude.  It’s often difficult for IT service providers (ITSPs) to convince business owners that no one can guarantee complete elimination of cyberattack risk. Anyone with a computer connected to the internet is under attack. Your best option is preparation for the inevitable.

Security technology is applied in layers starting outside the organization and then working inward. From the outside, a secure DNS (Domain Name Service) protects end users by looking up the IP address when they enter a URL into their browser, and then blocking access to known bad websites. 

Most infections originate with websites and email.  Email spam and virus protection filters incoming email by looking for known bad domains, email attachments and email content. Email spam filters also monitor sent email to protect your domain from being blacklisted should one of your computers become infected with a spam-bot.

A next generation firewall is essential for protection of digital business assets. It goes beyond filtering content, looking for intrusions and bad content, using artificial intelligence to recognize behavior patterns and block them before they do any harm.