CIS Critical Security Controls is a non-profit computer security organization that has been around decades. It is well-known for publishing their operating system best-practice security recommendations and benchmarks. The senior vice president of CIS is famous for the fog of more lecture series, and he argues that information overload is the main problems against better computer security.
For better cybersecurity, an organization should implement all the CIS top 20 controls. These controls have everything a computer security program should have. To have them a firm should start with these four top controls
- Implement a security awareness and training program
- Continuous vulnerability management
- Controlled use of administrative privileges
- Maintenance, monitoring, and analysis of audit logs
Implement a security awareness and training program
It was concluded that 90% of malicious data breaches occur because of phishing and social engineering. One can use different types of products such as firewalls, anti-malware, anti-spam, anti-phishing, and training to avoid them.
Besides using these products, some of the phishing can still get through to the end-user. So it is vital to train the end-users on how to recognize maliciousness and what to do once they recognize it. The training and awareness program should be provided multiple times within a year.
Continuous vulnerability management
More than 30 % of the data breaches occur due to Unpatched software. It is the second most frequent reason for data breaches. It is vital to automate patching as much as it is possible besides scanning your environment for vulnerabilities and missing patches.
Client-side vulnerabilities come with browsers and browsers add-in which are followed by the operating system holes. Whereas on the server-sides, vulnerabilities come with the webserver software, databases, and server management.
Controlled use of administrative privileges
To have a secure system, an organization should minimize the numbers of admin accounts and should use high-security products to protect the admin accounts. They should minimize the number of members of any elevated group and should use multi-factor authentication login. Keeping the time limit on the checkout is also important.
Maintenance, monitoring, and analysis of audit logs
Another reason for data breaches is weak security login. An organization should adopt two-factor authentication for better security. Security information event management also helps to improve security. An organization should modify and train the system to minimize false positives and false negatives.
