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Big data is a valuable asset for your business when outlining more effective strategies for attracting and retaining customers. However, if it gets into the wrong hands, it can mean disaster. In recent years we’ve seen many data breaches from large companies that we trust with our data. Safeguarding your organization’s data from corruption and unauthorized access can help you avoid potential financial repercussions from decreased consumer confidence.
In this guide, we’ll discuss everything from cybersecurity to data encryption and explain why it’s important that businesses of all sizes prioritize data security when storing sensitive information.
In this article, we’ll cover
What is data security?
Data security is the practice of protecting digital information from manipulation and unauthorized access during its entire lifecycle.
For businesses, this encompasses encrypting and securing customer data at rest and in transport, protecting your applications from malicious malware or ransomware attacks, and having security policies in place to detect and prevent a data breach.
Why is data security important?
In hackers published user data from 530 million Facebook users on an amateur hacking forum. Facebook published a blog post that said the hackers had scraped data by exploiting a vulnerability in an old feature on the platform that enabled users to find each other by searching for their phone numbers.
These cyberattacks happen regularly, and they can happen to any type of business regardless of size. More businesses today have sensitive data—specifically, personally identifiable information. Whether you have access to someone’s financial data or their healthcare information, you need to have the proper security controls and security tools in place to protect this information. A data breach can not only damage the trust of a company and lead to financial losses, but it can also lead to large fines for breaching the general data protection regulation (GDPR) laws.
Differences between data privacy vs. data security
While data security and data privacy are often used interchangeably, there are distinct differences:
- Data security refers to the controls, processes, and tools used to prevent data from being stolen or corrupted.
- Data privacy concerns how a company handles personal data.
Questionable data privacy practices might mean a company shares its customers’ data with other companies without their knowledge. A breach in data security, on the other hand, would mean the security solutions you have in place to protect your customer data have failed.
Data security types
There are many different aspects of data security that need to be considered when outlining an effective security strategy. In this section, we’ll go through the most common types of data security and how they can be used to secure your business’ valuable data—whether that’s your customer’s personal information or intellectual property.
Authentication
Authentication is the requirement of an authorized user to authenticate or prove their identitytoo to access certain types of data. The most basic form of authentication is a username and password. Biometrics is another technology that requires multi-factor authentication, such as a fingerprint and retinal scan, to access a system.
Firewalls
Firewalls can block certain IP addresses from accessing your application, or they can control the ports that you can use to communicate with a server. A correctly configured firewall can keep automated malicious traffic at bay.
Backups and recovery
Should an attacker erase information from your database or hard drives, you need a backup system in place to protect your users’ data. Most data security technologies offer automated backups at regular intervals to ensure that even though your primary data source is damaged or stolen, you can recover it from a scheduled data backup.
Tokenization
Tokenization refers to the process of turning a sensitive piece of data (like a Social Security number) into a random string of characters called a token. Security via tokens helps protect data in the event of a data breach because there is no way for a hacker to guess what the information means. Moreover, anyone with access can use a token inreal-timee in place of the information the token is protecting. Meaning it doesn’t take any longer for authorized users to use data that is tokenized.
Data masking
Data masking is the process of converting your real data into a fake version (i.e.,replacinge real names with fake ones, etc.). Masking is typically done when you want to test software or use sample data during a training session.
Encryption
Encryption is the process of converting information into a different form so that only those with the encryption key can access it. Many of the large cloud providers today ensure encryption-at-rest is the standard choice when creating a database.
Skills needed to keep your data and network safe
The first step is to ensure that you follow best practices to ensure you’re aligned with the latest trends in data security. There are a specific set of skills your professional security specialists need. In this section, we’ll take a look at what your business and respective security engineers need to keep your information safe.
Security engineering
Thinking about security from day one and building security defenses is critically important. Security engineers aim to protect a network from threats by engineering networks from the ground up to be safe, dependable, and secure. Security engineers design systems that protect the right things in the right ways. If a software engineer’s goal is to ensure things do happen (i.e., “click here, and this happens”), a security engineer’s goal is to ensure things don’t happen by designing, implementing, and testing complete and secure systems.
Security engineering covers a lot of ground and includes many measures—from regular security testing and code reviews to creating security architecture and threat models—to keep a network locked down and safe from a holistic standpoint.
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Encryption
If security engineering protects the network and physical assets like servers, computers, and databases, encryption protects the actual data and files that are stored on them or travel between them via the internet. Encryption strategies are crucial for any company using the cloud and are an excellent way to protect hard drives, data, and files that are in transit—in email, browsers, or on their way to the cloud.
If data is intercepted, encryption makes it difficult for hackers to do much with it. That’s because encrypted data is unreadable to unauthorized users without the encryption key. Encryption should not be an afterthought and should be carefully integrated into your network and your existing workflowforr it to be successful.
Intrusion detection and breach reports
If suspicious-looking actions are occurring on the network—like someone or something trying to break in—intrusion detection will pick up on it. Network intrusion detection systems (NIDS) constantly monitor network traffic for behavior that seems illicit or anomalous andflagg it for review. NIDS not only block that traffic, but also gather information about it andalertst network administrators.
Despite all this, breaches still happen. That’s why it’s important to engage a breach response expert to come up with a data breach response plan. You’ve got to be ready to spring into action with an effective framework. The framework can be updated as often as you need to—for example, if you have changes to network components or new threats arise that need to be addressed. A solid breach framework will ensure you’ve got resources in place and an easy-to-follow set of instructions for sealing the breach and what follows, whether that’s getting legal assistance, having insurance policies, data recovery plans, or notifying any partners of the issue.
Firewall development
What about keeping unwanted visitors and malicious software off your network? When it’s connected to the web, a good way to make sure only the right people and files are getting through is with firewalls: software designed with a set of rules to block unauthorized users from accessing your network. They’re excellent lines of defense for preventing data interceptions and blocking malware from entering your network, and they also keep important information from getting out, like passwords or confidential data.
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Vulnerability analysis
Hackers will often actively or passively scan networks for holes and vulnerabilities. Security analysis and vulnerability assessment professionals are key players in identifying potential holes and closing them off. Security analysis software is used to hone any vulnerabilities in a computer, network, or communications infrastructure. Each is prioritized and addressed with “protect, detect, and react” security plans.
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Penetration testing
Vulnerability analysis (identifying potential threats) can also include deliberately probing a network or system to find any weaknesses. This is also referred to as penetration testing. It’s an excellent way to safely identify vulnerabilities ahead of time and devise a plan to fix them. Whether there are flaws in the operating systems, issues with non-compliance, application code, or endpoint problems, a network administrator skilled in penetration testing can help you locate these issues and patch them so you’re less likely to have an attack.
Penetration testing involves running either manual or automated processes that “break-in”intoo servers, applications, networks, and even end users’ devices to see if it’s possible. It also seeks to pinpoint where the break-in was able to occur. From this, companies can generate a report for auditors as proof of compliance. It also provides a prioritized list of vulnerabilities to monitor.
A thorough penetration test can save you time and money by preventing costly attacks in weak areas you may not have known existed. System downtime can be another annoying side effect of malicious attacks, so regularly running penetration tests is a great way to head off problems before they arise.
Penetration testing shouldn’t be one-and-done—it should be relatively ongoing. You may also want to engage a penetration testing specialist on specific occasions, for example, when you open a new office location, add security patches as they are issued, or make any big changes to your network’s infrastructure.
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Security information and event management
There’s an even more holistic line of defense; you can employ to keep an eye on every touchpoint: security information and event management (SIEM). SIEM is an all-encompassing approach that monitors and gathers any details about IT security-related activity that may happen anywhere on the network, whether it’s on servers, endpoint devices, or security software like NIDS and firewalls. SIEM systems then compile and make that information centrally available in order to manage it, analyze those logs in real-time, and identify any patterns that stand out.
These systems can be rather complex to set up and maintain, so it’s important to engage a skilled SIEM administrator.
Cybersecurity HTTPS, SSL, and TLS
The internet itself is considered an unsecured network, and it’s a scary truth, especially when you realize it’s essentially the backbone for how we give and receive information. There are different standards and protocols for how information is sent over the internet to protect us against unwittingly sharing our private information all over the web. Encrypted connections and secure pages with HTTPS protocols can conceal and protect data that is sent and received in browsers. Encryption is used to create a secure communication channel. Internet security pros can implement TCP/IP protocols (with cryptography measures woven in) and encryption methods like a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) or a Transport Layer Security (TLS).
Anti-malware and anti-spyware software are important to have installed and updated regularly. Anti-malware monitors incoming internet traffic for malware like spyware, adware, or Trojan viruses.
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Endpoint Threat Detection and Data Loss Prevention (DLP)
Individuals can prevent ransomware attacks by following good security practices like having antivirus software, the latest OS, and backing up data to the cloud and a local device. However, it’s a different ball game for organizations with multiple personnel, systems, and facilities that are susceptible to attacks.
Your actual users—and the devices they use to access your network (e.g., mobile phones, laptops, or mobile point-of-sale systems)—can often be the weakest link in the security chain. An endpoint security expert can help prevent data loss and theft where it most frequently enters and leaves the network: with users. An endpoint security specialist may help implement various protection levels, such as authorization technology that grants a device access to your network.
Data loss prevention
Within endpoint security is another important security strategy: data loss prevention (DLP). Essentially, this encompasses the steps taken to ensure no sensitive data is sent from the network, whether on purpose or by accident. You can implement DLP software to monitor the network and make sure authorized end users aren’t copying or sharing private information or data they shouldn’t.
How to determine if your business data is secure
The first step is to ensure that you follow best practices to ensure that your business data is secure. Proper security checkups entail revisiting what we’ve mentioned above and auditing your current security strategy to look for any gaps.
It’s also a good idea to run security testing on your applications at regular intervals. Security testing can be done using automated tools that scan your sites for common vulnerabilities.
In some cases, however, you might require more creativity and insight into how your architecture looks as a whole. In this case, a white-hat hacker that tests your applications might be a better choice. A white-hat hacker usually goes through your entire application stack and can see where there might be holes to try and breakthrough. In some cases, white-hat hackers might also employ social engineering to try to get into your systems by tricking your employees into giving up information. With the heightened awareness of information security at a technical level, social engineering can work surprisingly well for those wishing to gain unauthorized access to systems.
To plan and execute your long-term data security efforts, hiring a data security specialist is probably your best bet. Having a dedicated professional to oversee your security will help you sleep better at night and will provide you with a knowledgeable partner to handle security concerns.
Conclusion
Data security is a highly relevant subject that requires businesses to rely on experts when handling large amounts of sensitive data. It’s important to remember that improved data security isn’t something that happens overnight (and isn’t something you only visit once).
Unsure where to start? Consider consulting with an information security analyst for some security recommendations. You’ll want to prioritize the most important efforts needed to secure your business and your user data and continually revisit your security strategy.
