The introduction of new technologies gives attackers more opportunities to attack your organization. Anyone who only intervenes when there is danger will sooner or later stumble. Security should be proactive, not reactive, Trend Micro preaches.

The risk to resilienceThis year, Trend Micro’s world tour is passing the beautiful church of the Ursuline Convent in Haacht. We think it’s a striking place, as the daily news of large-scale cyberattacks will have many business leaders lighting a candle. But once attackers have crossed your digital gates, even higher powers can no longer intervene. In a lively day of presentations, demos and gospel choirs, Trend Micro proclaims its gospel: Take control of your security sooner rather than later.

Great surface

“This message probably sounds familiar to you, but it is necessary to repeat it again and again,” emphasizes Regional Director Steven Heyde in his opening speech. “The attackers’ goal remains the same, which is to make quick profits, both in the form of money and physical goods. But now that larger ransomware incidents are gaining attention, attackers are becoming much more targeted to stay under the radar.”

You also have a lot more options than before. The digitization of society has accelerated in recent years. Many companies have embraced the cloud, adopting smart IoT devices and experimenting with artificial intelligence. Any technology is a potential gateway for those who know how to abuse it. Add to that the fact that employees are working from home, outside the secure environment of the office, and you have a potential attack surface that’s almost impossible to contain.

Attackers also have more and better means of exploiting this. There is money in cybercrime, a disgusting amount of money. “If you were to express the economic value of ransomware in terms of gross national product, cybercrime would be the third largest economy in the world,” warns Heyde.

Fortunately, organizations today have a wide range of security solutions to choose from. But that’s part of the problem, experts at Trend Micro say. “The glut of tools is particularly stressful for security teams. They can no longer make ends meet and therefore cannot react quickly to threats,” says Heyde. Although the company cannot resist convincing the public that Trend Vision One is the only platform that brings everything together.

Ransomware is the third largest economy in the world.

Steven Heyde, Regional Director Trend Micro Benelux

From reaction to prediction

The common thread throughout the day is that in the current and highly challenging cybersecurity landscape, there is a need for a new mindset. Steven Heyde would be the classic paradigm Protect, recognize, react preferably on the spot, to be banished to eternal purgatory. “Security needs to become much more proactive. Evaluation is perhaps the most important hatch. Anyone who has insight into possible security gaps also recognizes threats much more quickly and can intervene more effectively.”

Pieter Molen agrees: “We always felt that EDR was too concise as a strategy. Security is not limited to endpoints, it affects your entire infrastructure. Silos limit your manoeuvrability, so break them down as soon as possible.” So the idea of ​​XDR Advanced detection and response is therefore gaining much more recognition in the world of cybersecurity.

But XDR isn’t a panacea either, we learn from Molen: “With XDR you may be able to avoid being late, but it doesn’t change the fact that you’re always late.” The next step is then attack surface (risk) management, ASM for short. This is a much more proactive approach to security, where you try to find vulnerabilities before attackers do.

Nothing beats an impressive statistic to back up your argument. Molen: “Approximately seven out of ten attacks are the result of an unknown vulnerability in the IT systems. You cannot protect what you cannot see. The time to fix vulnerabilities is also getting shorter and shorter.”

Give points

How do you proceed? The purpose of ASM is to continuously analyze all access points in your IT network. This can be done by having your own security experts play the role of the hacker, or an external one rescue team to what you rent blue squad Then I have to record it. Based on these analyses, you assign each potential vulnerability a score that expresses the risk to the organization.

Molen highlights a few points that deserve attention: “These results are dynamic and flexible. What is not a risk today may be your greatest weakness tomorrow. It goes without saying that you must also address the risks immediately before exploiting them. An attacker only needs one vulnerability to penetrate.”

With XDR you might be able to avoid being late, but it doesn’t change the fact that you’re always late. You cannot protect what you cannot see.

Pieter Molen, Technical Director Trend Micro Benelux

More than an IT problem

For security professionals, ASM offers an additional benefit. It helps them use the resources made available to them more efficiently, which is already a little more for one organization than another. Management will be pleased too, because while awareness of the dangers is slowly but surely growing, safety teams continue to compete for a seat at the driver’s desk. A recent study by Trend Micro made this clear once again.

Steven Hyde explains why security teams and senior management often don’t speak the same language. “Security is still seen too much as an IT problem. A ransomware attack has a significant impact on all business processes. But there are also indirect effects: People are often reluctant to use new technologies for safety reasons. Security should allow you to do new things safely.”

Because of this attitude, the security teams often have to draw from the common IT pot. And the majority of the budget now flows into the cloud, as figures from Gartner, among others, show. “IT investments often need to pay off as quickly as they are made. That increases the pressure for everyone,” explains Gurmail Sing, who Director of Cloud Alliances made the journey from London to humble Haacht for the European market.

Security is still seen too much as an IT issue, even though it affects all business processes.

Steven Heyde, Regional Director Trend Micro Benelux

Security teams are then by definition at a disadvantage because they are sacred return on investment is difficult to express for investments in security. ASM translates this into business goals, says Molen. “A CEO will not look at a dashboard full of flashing lights. Clear reporting of where and why investments are needed helps reduce the overall cost of security without cutting corners.”

After a few more demos and testimonials on the Trend Vision One platform, the show is over and it’s time for a refreshing drink. It comes just in time, because if the temperatures weren’t already high enough, debates about cybersecurity would naturally increase. Here and there, organizations in 2023 will face much trickier tasks. If you not only protect more, but also more cleverly, you can extinguish the fire before smoke develops.

This is an editorial in partnership with Trend Micro. Learn more about the company’s security solution here.