By Danny Jenkins
In 2023, ransomware payments hit an all-time high, causing targeted organizations severe financial losses and reputational damage. No matter how strategically an organization invests in emerging technology to protect data and manage infrastructure, cybercriminals often seem to be one step ahead.
In this new landscape, conventional defense measures are proving insufficient to thwart malware and other attacks. With artificial intelligence (AI) at their disposal, cybercriminals are now launching attacks that are faster, more sophisticated, and harder to detect than ever before. AI-driven malware can adapt, learn from defenses in real time, and exploit vulnerabilities with precision, allowing it to slip past traditional security systems undetected.
To harden their systems, organizations are increasingly adopting Zero Trust: a cybersecurity model based on the principle of “never trust, always verify.”
What Is Zero Trust?
If someone knocks on your door, do you treat them as trustworthy unless they seem suspicious, or do you assume anyone could be dangerous until proven otherwise?
Traditionally, the cybersecurity industry did the former: implicitly trusting users, systems, and applications within a network while actively scanning for threats. This stance might make for a good neighbor, but in cyberspace, it puts organizations at risk of disastrous attacks and data breaches.
A better way to secure your business is adopting the Zero Trust philosophy of verifying users, devices, and applications and denying access to anything your organization does not trust until you can determine which entities are trustworthy. In the current digital environment, this model is necessary to provide the visibility and IT controls required to secure every device, user, app, and network that can access business data.
Historically, implementing a Zero Trust approach has been difficult, time-consuming, and costly. Organizations that wanted to change their cybersecurity strategy to Zero Trust faced a complex and expensive array of options that discouraged some and proved unattainable for others.
Fortunately, newer solutions make it easier and more affordable for organizations of any size to shift to Zero Trust. Organizations of all sizes now have access to comprehensive Zero Trust endpoint solutions that offer easy-to-manage tools for blocking untrusted software, controlling how applications behave, and managing user administrative rights.
But this alone is not enough. When choosing a Zero Trust cybersecurity strategy, you need to ensure you will be getting a solution with lightning-fast support that helps you take full advantage of its protective features.
Zero Trust in Action
Hattiesburg Clinic, a health care network with 17 locations throughout Mississippi, had long been plagued by malware attacks, but it had been fortunate never to have suffered a ransomware attack—yet.
Hattiesburg’s information security team knew it couldn’t just wait around for an attack on its network to happen, and then react. The organization needed to act first—before a breach threatened the security of its employees and partners and its patients’ data.
One challenge is the rise in threat actors that can bypass detection tools without triggering them. With a staff of 2,000 professionals, each vulnerable to phishing attacks, employee cybersecurity training and official software policies can’t suffice to keep individuals from installing unauthorized software or USB drives that might inadvertently introduce malicious code.
Hattiesburg adopted and enforced a Zero Trust strategy to secure its environment. This included preventing employees from running unapproved software. If they needed new software for business purposes, they could request approval from the information security team. “Since you never know what a piece of software is going to do to your computer, being able to control what gets installed is priceless,” says Jerry Robinson, the clinic’s director of information security.
ThreatLocker provided the cybersecurity software to support Hattiesburg’s new default-deny policies. We also set up a fast-response Cyber Hero Support Team with a dedicated engineer, working in lockstep with the clinic network to continually review emerging issues and find solutions in real time. “Not many vendors would go that distance to provide that level of support,” Robinson says.
A Safer Way to Work
Cyberthreats can cripple health care organizations, companies, governments—any business and its customers. With risks proliferating and growing more sophisticated, a Zero Trust mindset can help organizations protect both their valuable data and their customers.
Organizations need cybersecurity that can proactively defend against emerging threats and put IT professionals in control of their cyber defenses and protocols. A Zero Trust approach stops malicious software in its tracks, prevents the weaponization of legitimate tools, and keeps applications without permission from running.
The quest to outsmart cybercriminals by chasing each new menace is a losing battle. Using a Zero Trust approach can help business leaders and IT professionals feel more confident that their organizations are protected from the most sophisticated cybersecurity threats.
Danny Jenkins is CEO and co-founder of ThreatLocker.
Not sure how to start on cybersecurity? Learn about the Zero Trust strategy and ThreatLocker’s security technology.