Rethinking Endpoint Security

Part 1: Five guiding principles for choosing the optimal endpoint security solution

By Oleg Mogilevsky, Product Marketing Manager, Threat Prevention

With the sudden and massive shift to remote work, organizations and their endpoints have never been more vulnerable. Malicious actors are taking advantage of this situation, exploiting an unprecedented opportunity to breach organizations worldwide using endpoints as the top attack vector. Clearly, protecting endpoints today is more critical than ever.

To help security professionals assess their options, we listed below the five guiding principles for choosing the optimal endpoint security solution in the new normal.

With the sudden and massive shift to remote work, organizations and their endpoints have never been more vulnerable. Threat actors are becoming more and more sophisticated in their ability to exploit vulnerabilities, breach organizations’ IT infrastructures, and hack into sensitive data. As evidence, just recently Check Point Research confirmed a 50% increase in daily ransomware attacks across the globe.

It’s no surprise then that in a study conducted in early 2020, 39%[1] of security professionals reported that they are not confident in their existing endpoint protection solution’s resilience.

The cornerstones of the modern endpoint security

To help you choose a solution that can secure your organization’s endpoint devices from all imminent threats without impacting business continuity, we have outlined the core principles that make endpoint security truly effective these days:

Principle #1: a prevention-first approach

No doubt preventing an attack saves an organization a lot of time and money. The cost of a malware attack, for example, is estimated to reach $2.6 million[2] per company, on average. And it doesn’t end at cost and time. There is also always the risk of damage to brand equity and customer trust.

Needless to say, prevention of a network breach will always outdo detection and remediation.

We invite you to download the Buyer’s Guide to Endpoint Security to learn about the guiding principles for choosing the optimal solution.

Principle #2: AI-driven multilayered security

Today’s security reality is complex, characterized by many layers. There are millions of strains of unknown malware and many sophisticated evasion techniques. This means that stopping today’s most dangerous attacks requires inspecting more than one layer.

However, traditional solutions, including antivirus, sandboxing, and legacy endpoint protection products, offer limited inspection and lack the sophistication required for such complexity.

To outwit today’s sophisticated cybercriminals, the endpoint protection solution must be driven by artificial intelligence and be able to inspect every layer of the attack surface, going beyond traditional detection methods such as signatures and rules.

Principle #3: post-infection remediation and recovery

Unfortunately, regardless of how comprehensive the security solution may be, one cannot assume that the organization won’t get hit with a cyberattack. Everyone gets compromised at one point or another.

Accordingly, it is critical to be prepared with state-of-the-art post-infection remediation and recovery capabilities.

Principle #4: a consolidated security and threat intelligence architecture

As complicated as ensuring security can be, the task becomes all the more complex when multiple solutions from multiple vendors must be managed.

It is no surprise then that according to a recent survey, 99% of security professionals agree that using solutions from multiple security vendors introduces unnecessary challenges. Moreover, 69% agree that consolidating to fewer vendors would lead to better security.

Principle #5: unified and cloud-based management

An endpoint protection solution that serves as a single, unified agent can streamline processes, simplifies management, and reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO).

Furthermore, the benefits of the cloud are well known – from elasticity to flexibility, scale, and speed. There is no argument that the cloud is the way to go.

Stay tuned! In the next few days, we’ll share what we think are the five must-haves of a complete endpoint security solution in the modern era to protect organizations against the most imminent threats.

Download the Buyer’s Guide to Endpoint Security to learn more about the five core principles for choosing the right solution and the questions you should ask during the evaluation process.

[1]Dimensional research, 2020

[2] https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2019/03/07/cyberattack-cost-2018/