FEATURE no coincidence that among them sit numerous remote desktop and VPN vulnerabilities . In recent months , we ’ ve also seen a surge in ransomware targeting multinational businesses .
The attacks that have happened since the end of summer are all the inevitable results of basic security principles such as change control and patching management that have been overlooked to enable that connectivity .
The 2021 challenge – Wiping the slate clean
The remote access workarounds that marked the early stages of the pandemic were a necessary evil for many IT teams . Not all businesses faced the same challenges , but for those that did , the new task is to balance their performance needs without sacrificing security .
What will benefit these companies going into 2021 is that they ’ ve opened themselves up to the possibility of change . Businesses , particularly large multinationals , can be resistant to change . It breeds risk , it costs money and it takes time .
Now , however , almost all companies have been forced to change , and will be forced to change again going into 2021 . Most will understandably start with their user base to enable secure access . However , this also provides the opportunity to look at the broader ecosystem and consider their application base , their server base and their cloud base .
I think 2020 will be a lesson learned for many businesses . Moving forward , organisations will have to stop differentiating between access within the corporate office and remote access . In a modern work environment , staff will be able to securely access their business critical apps in an identical manner , no matter where they are working from . However , businesses will need to shift their mindset to make this a reality . u www . intelligentciso . com
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