As remote work and hybrid work have risen in prominence, so has the concept of Zero Trust. In a world where perimeters have expanded with the integration of IoT machines and mobile devices, securing the digital edges of any organization is a challenge. With asynchronous ‘digital nomads’ logging in to access company resources across the globe, a company’s cybersecurity personnel may be faced with thousands of individuals using thousands of endpoints from a thousand locations.
Traditional perimeter-based defensive postures are simply insufficient with so many disparate endpoints scattered world-wide. This concern has led many individuals across industries and sectors to shift their focus toward a Zero Trust framework.
What is Zero Trust?
Even before 2020, cybersecurity experts and industry leaders had begun discussing the importance of Zero Trust. The National Institute of Standards and Technology defines Zero Trust as “[a] collection of concepts and ideas designed to minimize uncertainty in enforcing accurate, least privilege per-request access decisions in information systems and services in the face of a network viewed as compromised.”
Boiled down, the spirit of Zero Trust is what it sounds like: absolutely no device or user is assumed to be inherently safe. This is expressed in a commonly touted aphorism: Never Trust, Always Verify.
Implementation
Of course, reciting pithy phrases doesn’t necessarily mean one understands the nuts and bolts of using a Zero Trust framework. Organizations must consider how legacy systems and machines will be affected, how and when staff will be trained, and other important technical details.
In Zero Trust, access is granted based on who is requesting and from what device, taking the user’s regular behavior into account to determine risk. Internal and external threats are assumed. Individuals are given least privileged access for jobs, meaning that they are only given the minimum amount of information or resources needed to complete a task.
After the President of the United States issued an Executive Order enacting federal agencies’ transition towards a Zero Trust architecture, the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released guidance outlining what would constitute traditional, advanced, and optimal zero trust architecture.
Their work is based on five pillars: Identity, Device, Network/Environment, Application Workload, Data. The content also reflects a Special Publication by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) outlining seven tenants of Zero Trust. These tenants provide a basis for how to think about resources, access policies, and asset and communication security in a zero trust architecture.
To learn more about the specifics of the CISA Zero Trust Maturity Model, go to the CISA website.
While CISA is targeted towards government agencies in the United States of America, companies can utilize this information to protect their own systems and data.
How Can Endpoints Be Secured?
In Zero Trust, part of having verified users is having secured devices. When proprietary and sensitive data is being accessed from BYOD and mobile machines, those endpoints need mechanisms in place to ensure the correct individual is using them.
But what happens when an endpoint attempts suspicious actions and is flagged by digital security? In such a case, locking the entire device and wiping the contents might be necessary, removing any passwords, files, or documents from the laptop, tablet, or phone in question.
An Endpoint Security Solution such as DriveStrike allows organizations to wipe devices in untrusted locations or making questionable access requests. In events when users and devices are failing to meet verification standards, quick action is key to protecting an organization’s broader network.
In the modern world, the digital footprints of organizations are going to continue to grow. Cybersecurity professionals need to be prepared to secure data, and utilizing a Zero Trust framework to defend your endpoints is essential!
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