Why Zero Trust Should be the Foundation of Your Cybersecurity Ecosystem

For cybersecurity professionals, it is a huge challenge to
separate the “good guys” from the “villains”. In the past, most
cyberattacks could simply be traced to external cybercriminals,
cyberterrorists, or rogue nation-states. But not
anymore.

Threats from within organizations – also known as “insider
threats” – are increasing and cybersecurity practitioners are
feeling the pain.

Traditional perimeter defenses are not designed to prevent these
attacks. They also struggle to keep external attackers
out. Clever hackers continuously find ways in and “weaponize” their
trusted status inside the network to compromise sensitive assets
and orchestrate larger attacks.

And an increasing number of enterprise resources – applications,
devices, data, and even people – now live outside the perimeter.
It’s difficult to protect these assets with legacy approaches, much
less fortify the perimeter to keep attackers out completely.

How can you protect your organization in this landscape?

The answer: Adopt a zero trust approach to cybersecurity.

Of course, this is easier said than done. That’s why Cynet^[1] has created a free eBook
called “Implementing zero trust: Key considerations
before you begin^[2]” for you. The guide
explains how your organization can design a zero trust
implementation strategy, select an appropriate methodology,
assemble the right tools, and execute the implementation plan for
successful zero trust adoption.

What is Zero Trust?

The traditional perimeter relies on a “trust but verify”
approach where all users and endpoints are automatically trusted
once they are “in” the network. But as we have seen, this method
creates serious security risks, both from malicious internal actors
and from external actors compromising legitimate credentials.

Zero trust aims to eliminate this risk with its “trust nothing,
verify everything” approach. It involves continuously monitoring
and validating the privileges of each user and device along with
vetting all access requests before allowing that user or device to
access an enterprise asset.

The Growth of Zero Trust

Recently, zero trust has developed a large following due to a
surge in insider attacks and an increase in remote work – both of
which challenge the effectiveness of traditional perimeter-based
security approaches.

A 2021 global enterprise survey^[3]
found that 72% respondents had adopted zero trust or planned to in
the near future. Gartner^[4]
predicts that spending on zero trust solutions will more than
double to $1.674 billion between now and 2025.

Governments are also mandating zero trust architectures for
federal organizations. These endorsements from the largest
organizations have accelerated zero trust adoption across every
sector. Moreover, these developments suggest that zero trust will
soon become the default security approach for every
organization.

Should You Adopt Zero Trust?

Zero trust enables organizations to protect their assets by
reducing the chance and impact of a breach. It also reduces the
average breach cost by at least $1.76 million^[5], can prevent five cyber disasters^[6]
per year, and save an average of $20.1 million^[7]
in application downtime costs.

However, deciding to embrace zero trust is much easier than
actually implementing it. For many organizations, the transition
process can be both overwhelming and labor-intensive. “Implementing zero
trust: Key considerations before you begin^[8]” can help reduce the
intimidation factor and simplify the approach to a zero trust
deployment.

New eBook Helps You Implement Zero Trust

The Cynet zero trust eBook^[9]
walks through the core concepts and principles of zero trust. It
highlights the key considerations you should be aware of during
implementation, including:

• How can you design the implementation strategy and select the
  best methodology?
• How should you update your existing security stack?
• Which security policies, protocols, and tools do you need?
• What is the best way to execute an implementation plan?
• And finally, how can extended detection and response (XDR)
  strengthen your Zero Trust ecosystem?

The eBook serves as a guide to answer all these questions and
discusses how pairing zero trust with an extended detection and
response (XDR) platform can provide a far greater fabric of
security than using either one alone.

By combining multiple defenses such as threat prevention,
detection, and automated response, XDR provides a strong foundation
to a zero trust strategy.

Zero trust is possible without XDR. But with XDR, it’s
much harder for bad actors to breach your systems or compromise
your mission-critical assets.

If you are considering a zero trust implementation, or are
currently deploying one, this eBook was written for you.

Download Implementing zero trust:
Key considerations before you begin.^[10]