Why Insider Threats in 2021 Require Strong Endpoint Security

Why do insider threats in 2021 require stronger endpoint security solutions? 

Generally, IT decision-makers and cybersecurity discourses focus on external threats. Of course, the reasons for this pattern are obvious; malware and ransomware attacks, identity compromises, and other cybersecurity tend to stem from without rather than within. Besides, hackers make for compelling media stories, evident by the sheer volume of them. 

However, a sizable and worrisome percentage of cyber-threats begins from within, namely through insider threats. Sometimes, these begin with simple negligence, rather than malice. At other times, malice is both the means and the goal. 

At the best of times, insider threats prove difficult to detect until far, far too late. Worse, most enterprises don’t currently operate under “the best of times.” Most of the world continues to struggle with the fallout of COVID-19 (which may yet take a dark turn), and therefore most businesses continue to use a work-from-home model. 

Obviously, remote workforces pose unique security challenges and opportunities for insider threats. However, strong endpoint security can help. Here’s how.

Why Insider Threats in 2021 Require Strong Endpoint Security 

Data Loss Prevention Stops Malicious and Non-Malicious Activities

Basically, data loss prevention (DLP) keeps all of your data under lockdown. Data can’t leave the IT environment or network without permissions, nor can employees just upload data to whatever databases they choose. It regulates all of your data and puts it under your control. 

Obviously, this can help stop embarrassing database exposures, since employees can’t absentmindedly upload data to the cloud and then forget it. However, it also demonstrates how insider threats in 2021 wither in the face of endpoint security. Even with a disparate workforce, you can ensure data doesn’t leave the IT environment by preventing outgoing emails with sensitive data, malicious data movements, or signs of insider threats. 

Essentially, DLP kneecaps insider threats involving data theft or exposure before it occurs. But can it also detect insider threats before they happen? 

Behavioral Analytics, Human and Not

One of the key challenges in modern cybersecurity is making sure that hackers can’t just bypass authentication and enjoy free-reign over the network. Without some mechanism of continuous authentication and monitoring, then a sufficiently savvy hacker can just slip in through a backdoor and cause damage for months before detection. 

Continuous authentication often falls under the purview of identity management. Yet endpoint security can also provide some useful capabilities in these cases, which make them vital in preventing insider threats in 2021. 

First, endpoint security can enable IT teams to ask for connecting devices to register with them in some fashion. This means that teams know who registers what device, from where, and for what purposes, which makes attempts at remote deception that much harder. Second, endpoint security creates machine identities for all of the devices, for which they can establish baselines. If a device violates its baseline behaviors, the security system can generate alerts for the IT team or perhaps freeze the device’s permissions until an investigation.

Preventing insider threats in 2021 means cutting them off before they really begin. Endpoint security can help. 

To learn more, be sure to check out our Endpoint Security Buyer’s Guide.