A company’s data is its crown jewel. However, because of its value, there will always be someone looking to get their hands on it. In 2018 the United States experienced a 40% increase in data breaches, according to a report by the Identity Theft Resource Center and CyberScout. Whether it be a cybercriminal or a disgruntled employee, your company’s sensitive data always has a price tag which calls for extensive methods to protect it. Fortunately for you, though, it has become relatively easy to reduce your potential exposure to data breaches.
Don’t make it easy for hackers.
Secure and Protect Your Company’s Most Sensitive Data
Here a few ways you can clamp down on this threat by having access control in place to protect sensitive data on multiple levels within your organization.
The Fundamentals of Access Control
In today’s digital world, it is more important than ever for organizations to limit access to sensitive data and physical locations. While most organizations have existing infrastructures, or procedures in place to limit access to networks, systems, and applications, access control is a fundamental security technique used to regulate who can view or use company resources in a computing environment and minimize any potential risks to the business or organization.
So, how does access control directly benefit your business? Well, for starters, physical access control specifically refers to the selective restriction of access to a space. This means that people cannot physically enter server rooms or areas where confidential information is kept, giving them the opportunity to use it to their advantage. A few examples of this scenario would include fob controlled gates or RFID doors.
Another great example of access control is the creation of strong passwords to help protect sensitive information sent via email or uploaded to cloud services. In a 2018 survey conducted by U.S.-based security firm Voltage, out of nearly 300 IT professionals, 48% didn’t know which countries their data resided in once it was uploaded to a could service. With a proper access control system in place, you can implement a new password policy that can be used to configure multiple password policies, as opposed to one global policy for your entire directory.
This configuration also allows you to assign password policies either to particular users or to sets of users. For example, certain databases can now require a password to access particular systems, and if someone repeatedly tries to enter the wrong password, the system can lock the user out and require a system administrator to reset their login credentials.
Lastly, if the standard use of usernames and passwords to maintain security isn’t enough to ease your mind, multiple-authentication-factor (MAF) (also known as two-factor authentication (2FA)) is another method through which a user’s identity is confirmed. Using a combination of multiple components to verify the authenticity of the identity claimed, 2FA provides a safe environment to employees and adds to the existing security of your building premises and assets while also giving you the ability to control who has access to any high-security areas in your office premises.
Access control serves a vital function within an organization, and with the help of any of these methods, critical and sensitive data can be protected from potentially unwanted intruders. With access control, you can ensure the safety of all of your employees, business assets, and resources.
Contact TED Systems today for more information on how to keep your company’s data safe and secure.