What is Next Generation Endpoint Security?

There are all kinds of potential threats posed by a remote workforce, including the use of personal devices for work, the increased probability that remote employees will violate corporate security policies, and the fact that cybercriminals are taking advantage of the surge in remote work to exploit new attack vectors exposed by reliance on telework infrastructure. As a result, many organizations’ face the need to reevaluate their approach to endpoint security – to recognize the existing gaps and have a  next generation endpoint security to address the challenges of today and tomorrow.

Buyer's Guide Schedule a Demo

What is Next Generation Endpoint Security?

Telework Demands a New Approach to Cybersecurity

The COVID-19 pandemic transformed “business as usual” for many organizations. Companies that previously had no telework policy now have most or all of their employees working from home. To make matters more complicated, this switch to remote work happened suddenly, with little or no time for organizations to prepare.

 

As a result, many organizations’ cybersecurity strategies are not designed for a world of remote work and require significant updates to address the cyber threats posed by remote work. The traditional approach to cybersecurity, defending the perimeter of the enterprise network and trusting anyone inside that perimeter, is ineffective when the majority of an organization’s employees and network resources are now outside of this perimeter.

 

Currently, the endpoint is not widely considered an integral part of the enterprise security architecture despite the fact that the majority of cyberattacks originate at the endpoint. In the past, a significant percentage of these attacks could be detected and blocked as they passed through the enterprise network perimeter. With employees working from home without the benefit of these perimeter-based defenses, securing the endpoint is essential to securing the enterprise.

 

However, this need to significantly overhaul their security processes and procedures could not have come at a worse time for many organizations. The cybersecurity industry is experiencing a massive skills gap, meaning that many organizations lack the staff and expertise required to effectively protect against cyber threats. Additionally, many organizations are reliant upon a legacy, unintegrated cybersecurity infrastructure, consisting of many standalone systems that are difficult and expensive to monitor and maintain.

Guiding Principles for Next-Generation Endpoint Security in a Remote Work World

When developing a next-generation endpoint security strategy, following certain guiding principles is vitally important:

 

  • Prevention-First Approach: The number and sophistication of cyber threats is growing rapidly. A focus on prevention is essential to ensuring that lean security teams are not overwhelmed and to minimizing the cost and impact of cyberattacks on the organization.
  • AI-Driven Security: Security teams lack the ability to scale to meet their growing workloads. Leveraging AI to automate and expedite threat detection, investigation, and response maximizes the efficiency and effectiveness of limited security personnel.
  • Strong Remediation and Recovery Capabilities: With a remote workforce, employee computers will be compromised by cybercriminals. Security teams need to have the policies, procedures, and tools required to rapidly and effectively remediate a security incident.
  • Consolidated Security: Reliance on an array of standalone security solutions means that security analysts waste valuable time switching between dashboards and lack the comprehensive visibility required to detect and respond to incidents. Next-generation security requires a consolidated security architecture with single-pane-of-glass visibility and management.
  • Strong Real-Time Threat intelligence: The cyber threat landscape evolves rapidly, with many campaigns active for only minutes or hours. Access to real-time, strong threat intelligence is essential to an organization’s ability to protect against the latest threats, not ones from days or weeks ago.
  • Unified to Reduce TCO: Deploying separate solutions for EPP, EDR, NGAV, VPN, etc. creates a complex environment that is difficult and expensive to configure and maintain. Deploying a unified security solution is essential to minimizing the total cost of ownership (TCO) of enterprise cybersecurity.
  • Cloud-Based: As corporate resources move to the cloud, it is essential that cybersecurity solutions follow. A cloud-based security solution provides native protection to cloud assets as well as taking advantage of the flexibility and scalability offered by the cloud.

Securing Your Remote Workforce with Check Point

A remote workforce introduces more frequent and sophisticated  threats to an organization’s cybersecurity. As a result, updating corporate security strategies based upon best practices for remote work security is an essential next step for many organizations.

 

An important part of this security policy redesign is acknowledging the increased importance of securing the endpoint. With employees working from home on insecure networks and lacking the protection of the corporate security platform, the probability of compromised endpoints grows significantly. Without a robust endpoint security solution, these compromised machines can be used as a stepping stone to target the enterprise network.

 

Check Point’s Harmony Endpoint advanced endpoint protection solution provides organizations with the tools that they need to protect their remote workforce.

To learn more about Harmony Endpoint, check out this video. You’re also welcome to request a personalized demonstration to see Harmony Endpoint in action or try it out yourself with a free trial.

×
  Feedback
This website uses cookies for its functionality and for analytics and marketing purposes. By continuing to use this website, you agree to the use of cookies. For more information, please read our Cookies Notice.
OK