In addition to using trusted anti-malware and security software to protect computer systems, here are some best practices to consider:
- Apply updates as directed by IT: Software providers regularly offer updates to protect against malicious code, but they're not always secure. They might introduce a new vulnerability, contain a trojan, and so on—so it’s best to install updates based on IT's recommendations.
- Educate your staff: Practicing good cyber hygiene online goes a long way against malware. Make sure your staff know the basics, such as how to spot phishing emails, malicious pop ups, and suspicious software. This gives bad actors the smallest window of opportunity to attack.
- Rely on secure encrypted connections: Encrypt as much information as possible, both in transit and at rest, and ensure users only connect via secure tunnels.
- Leverage advanced endpoint security: If your workforce requires remote access or uses personal devices not under IT control for work, make sure all endpoints connecting into your system are secured and monitored.
- Use multifactor authentication: To better prevent unauthorized access, set up multifactor authentication to add further levels of verification when users request access to sensitive systems or data.
- Implement zero trust security: With zero trust security, anyone—no matter who they are, what they’re accessing, or where they’re connecting—is treated as a potential threat until they can prove otherwise.
Advanced Malware Protection (AMP)
The security marketplace is full of anti-malware solutions, and organizations worldwide spend millions on them each year—yet the breaches continue. From a lack of full traffic visibility to fundamentally ineffective passthrough inspection architectures, traditional malware protection just doesn’t work the way it needs to in today’s threat landscape.
What’s more, advanced malware is capable of penetrating tougher defenses, such as those on Apple iOS, Android devices, or Microsoft, to deploy executable files that facilitate data breaches, distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, cryptojacking, and more. This makes it all the more important to have AMP in your security stack.
At a glance, legacy approaches fall short when it comes to:
- Inspecting all traffic: Passthrough architectures like next-generation firewalls only perform packet-level inspection; they can’t inspect full content from start to finish.
- Performing at scale: Physical appliances and their virtualized counterparts have limited processing power, which can leave you exposed, especially when encrypted traffic demands massive compute.
- Stopping unknown malware: Legacy threat isolation solutions don’t operate inline, which means threats can’t be blocked—they can only be flagged after a compromise occurs, when it may be too late.
- Protecting off-network users: When users drop off the traditional network and VPN, your IT and security teams lose any ability to enforce policy and security controls.
Implementing the latest holistic threat protection gives your organization the best chance to repel malware and keep your network, endpoints, and data secure. To make this happen, you need security solutions built in the cloud, for the cloud, with a worldwide footprint that shares new protection instantly, anywhere. You need Zscaler Advanced Threat Protection.