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Why DSPM Should Take A Slice of Your 2024 Cyber Security Budget

November 2, 2023
3
 Min Read
Data Security

We find ourselves in interesting times. Enterprise cloud transformations have given rise to innovative cloud security technologies that are running at a pace even seasoned security leaders find head-spinning. As security professionals grapple with these evolving dynamics, they face a predicament of conflicting priorities that directly impact budget decisions. 

So much innovation and possibilities, yet, the economic climate is demanding consolidation, simplification, and yes, budget cuts. So, how do you navigate this tricky balancing act? On one hand, you need to close those critical cybersecurity gaps, and on the other, you must embrace new technology to innovate and stay competitive. To add a touch more complexity, there’s the issue of CIOs suffering from "change fatigue." According to Gartner, this fatigue manifests as CIOs hesitate to invest in new projects and initiatives, pushing a portion of 2023's IT spending into 2024, a trend that is likely to continue into 2025. CIOs are prioritizing cost control, efficiencies, and automation, while scaling back those long IT projects that take ages to show returns. 

Cloud Security - A Top Investment 

PwC suggests that cloud security is one of the top investment areas for 2024. The cloud's complex landscape, often poorly managed, presents a significant challenge. Astoundingly, 97% of organizations have gaps in their cloud risk management plans. The cloud security arena is nothing short of a maze that is difficult to navigate, driving enterprises towards vendor consolidation in an effort to reduce complexity, drive greater predictability and achieve positive ROI quickly. 

The cloud data security challenge is far from being solved, and this is precisely why the demand for Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) solutions is on the rise. DSPM shines a light on the entire multi-cloud estate by bringing in the data context. With easy integrations, DSPM enriches the entire cloud security stack, driving more operational efficiencies as a result of accurate data risk quantification and prioritization. By proactively reducing the data attack surface on an ongoing basis, DSPM plays a role in reducing the overall risk profile of the organization. 

 DSPM's Role in Supporting C-Suite Challenges 

Sometimes amid economic uncertainty and regulatory complexities, taking a comprehensive and granular approach to prioritize data risks can greatly enhance your 2024 cybersecurity investments. 

DSPM plays a vital role in addressing the intricate challenges faced by CISOs and their teams. By ensuring the correct security posture for sensitive data, DSPM brings a new level of clarity and control to data security, making it an indispensable tool for navigating the complex data risk landscape. DSPM enables CISOs to make informed decisions and stay one step ahead of evolving threats, even in the face of uncertainty.

Let's break it down and bottom line why DSPM should have a spot in your 2024 budget:

  • DSPM isn't just a technology; it's a proactive and strategic approach that empowers you to harness the full potential of  your cloud data while having a clear prioritized view of your most critical data risks that will impact remediation efficiency and accurate assessment of your organization’s overall risk profile. 
  • Reduce Cloud Storage Costs via the detection and elimination  of unused data,  and drive up operational efficiency from targeted and prioritized remediation efforts that focus on the critical data risks that matter. 
  • Cloud Data Visibility comes from DSPM providing security leaders with a crystal-clear view of their organization's most critical data risks. It offers unmatched visibility into sensitive data across multi-cloud environments, ensuring that no sensitive data remains undiscovered. The depth and breadth of data classification provides enterprises with a solid foundation to benefit from multiple use case scenarios spanning DLP,  data access governance, data privacy and compliance, and cloud security enrichment.  
  • Manage & Monitor Risk Proactively: Thanks to its ability to understand data context, DSPM offers accurate and prioritized data risk scores. It's about embracing the intricate details within larger multi-cloud environments that enable security professionals to make well-informed decisions. Adding the layer of data sensitivity, with its nuanced scoring, enriches this context even further. DSPM tools excel at recognizing vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and policy violations. This empowers organizations to address these issues before they escalate into incidents.
  • Regulatory Compliance undertakings to abide by data protection regulations, becomes simplified with DSPM, helping organizations steer clear of hefty penalties. Security teams can align their data security practices with industry-specific data regulations and standards. Sentra assesses how your data security posture stacks up against standard compliance and security frameworks your organization needs to comply with. 
  • Sentra's agentless DSPM platform offers quick setup, rapid ROI, and seamless integration with your existing cloud security tools. It deploys effortlessly in your multi-cloud environment within minutes, providing valuable insights from day one. DSPM enhances your security stack, collaborating with CSPMs, CNAPPs, and CWPPs to prioritize data risks based on data sensitivity and security posture. It ensures data catalog accuracy and completeness, supports data backup, and aids SIEMs and Security Lakes in threat detection. DSPM also empowers Identity Providers for precise access control and bolsters detection and access workflows by tagging data-based cloud workloads, optimizing data management, compliance, and efficiency

The Path Forward

2024 is approaching fast, and DSPM is an investment in long-term resilience against the ever-evolving data risk landscape.  In planning 2024's cybersecurity budget, it's essential to find a balance between simplification, innovation and cost reduction.  DSPM plays an important part in this intricate budgeting dance and stands ready to play its part. 

Read insightful articles by the Sentra team about different topics, such as, preventing data breaches, securing sensitive data, and more.

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Team Sentra
Team Sentra
October 28, 2024
3
Min Read
Data Security

Spooky Stories of Data Breaches

Spooky Stories of Data Breaches

As Halloween approaches, it’s the perfect time to dive into some of the scariest data breaches of 2024. Just like monsters hiding in haunted houses, cyber threats quietly move through the digital world, waiting to target vulnerable organizations.

The financial impact of cyberattacks is immense. Cybersecurity Ventures estimates global cybercrime will reach $9.5 trillion in 2024 and $10.5 trillion by 2025. Ransomware, the top threat, is projected to cause damages from $42 billion in 2024 to $265 billion by 2031.

If those numbers didn’t scare you, the 2024 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report highlights that out of 30,458 cyber incidents, 10,626 were confirmed data breaches, with one-third involving ransomware or extortion. Ransomware has been the top threat in 92% of industries and, along with phishing, malware, and DDoS attacks, has caused nearly two-thirds of data breaches in the past three years.

Let's explore some of the most spine-tingling breaches of 2024 and uncover how they could have been avoided.

Major Data Breaches That Shook the Digital World

The Dark Secrets of National Public Data

The latest National Public Data breach is staggering, just this summer, a hacking group claims to have stolen 2.7 billion personal records, potentially affecting nearly everyone in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. This includes American Social Security numbers. They published portions of the stolen data on the dark web, and while experts are still analyzing how accurate and complete the information is (there are only about half a billion people between the US, Canada, and UK), it's likely that most, if not all, social security numbers have been compromised.

The Haunting of AT&T

AT&T faced a nightmare when hackers breached their systems, exposing the personal data of 7.6 million current and 65.4 million former customers. The stolen data, including sensitive information like Social Security numbers and account details, surfaced on the dark web in March 2024.

Change Healthcare Faces a Chilling Breach

In February 2024, Change Healthcare fell victim to a massive ransomware attack that exposed the personal information of millions of individuals, with 145 million records exposed. This breach, one of the largest in healthcare history, compromised names, addresses, Social Security numbers, medical records, and other sensitive data. The incident had far-reaching effects on patients, healthcare providers, and insurance companies, prompting many in the healthcare industry to reevaluate their security strategies.

The Nightmare of Ticketmaster

Ticketmaster faced a horror of epic proportions when hackers breached their systems, compromising 560 million customer records. This data breach included sensitive details such as payment information, order history, and personal identifiers. The leaked data, offered for sale online, put millions at risk and led to potential federal legal action against their parent company, Live Nation.

How Can Organizations Prevent Data Breaches: Proactive Steps

To mitigate the risk of data breaches, organizations should take proactive steps. 

  • Regularly monitor accounts and credit reports for unusual activity.
  • Strengthen access controls by minimizing over-privileged users.
  • Review permissions and encrypt critical data to protect it both at rest and in transit. 
  • Invest in real-time threat detection tools and conduct regular security audits to help identify vulnerabilities and respond quickly to emerging threats.
  • Implement Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) to detect shadow data and ensure proper data hygiene (i.e. encryption, masking, activity logging, etc.) 

These measures, including multi-factor authentication and routine compliance audits, can significantly reduce the risk of breaches and better protect sensitive information.

Best Practices to Secure Your Data 

Enough of the scary news, how do we avoid these nightmares?

Organizations can defend themselves starting with Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) tools. By finding and eliminating shadow data, identifying over-privileged users, and monitoring data movement, companies can significantly reduce their risk of facing these digital threats.

Looking at these major breaches, it's clear the stakes have never been higher. Each incident highlights the vulnerabilities we face and the urgent need for strong protection strategies. Learning from these missteps underscores the importance of prioritizing data security.

As technology continues to evolve and regulations grow stricter, it’s vital for businesses to adopt a proactive approach to safeguarding their data. Implementing proper data security measures can play a critical role in protecting sensitive information and minimizing the risk of future breaches.

Sentra: The Data Security Platform for the AI era

Sentra enables security teams to gain full visibility and control of data, as well as protect against sensitive data breaches across the entire public cloud stack. By discovering where all the sensitive data is, how it's secured, and where it's going, Sentra reduces the 'data attack surface', the sum of all places where sensitive or critical data is stored or traveling to.Sentra’s cloud-native design combines powerful Data Discovery and Classification, DSPM, DAG, and DDR capabilities into a complete Data Security Platform (DSP). With this, Sentra customers achieve enterprise-scale data protection and answer the important questions about their data. Sentra DSP provides a crucial layer of protection distinct from other infrastructure-dependent layers. It allows organizations to scale data protection across multi-clouds to meet enterprise demands and keep pace with ever-evolving business needs. And it does so very efficiently - without creating undue burdens on the personnel who must manage it.

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Meni Besso
Meni Besso
October 10, 2024
3
Min Read
Compliance

The Need for Continuous Compliance

The Need for Continuous Compliance

As compliance breaches rise and hefty fines follow, establishing and maintaining strict compliance has become a top priority for enterprises. However, compliance isn't a one-time or  even periodic task or something you can set and forget. To stay ahead, organizations are embracing continuous compliance - a proactive, ongoing strategy to meet regulatory requirements and uphold security standards.

Let’s explore what continuous compliance is, the advantages it offers, some challenges it may present, and how Sentra can help organizations achieve and sustain it.

What is Continuous Compliance?

Continuous compliance is the ongoing process of monitoring a company’s security practices and applying appropriate controls to ensure they consistently meet regulatory standards and industry best practices. Instead of treating compliance as a one-time task, it involves real-time monitoring to catch and address non-compliance issues as they happen. It also includes maintaining a complete inventory of where your data is at all times, what risks and security posture is associated, and who has access to it. This proactive approach ensures you are always ‘audit ready’ and helps avoid last-minute fixes before audits or cyber attacks, ensuring continuous security across the organization.

Why Do Companies Need Continuous Compliance?

Continuous compliance is essential for companies to ensure they are always aligned with industry regulations and standards, reducing the risk of violations and penalties. 

Here are a few key reasons why it's crucial:

  1. Regulatory Changes: Compliance standards frequently evolve. Continuous monitoring ensures companies can adapt quickly to new regulations without major disruptions.
  2. Avoiding Fines and Penalties: Non-compliance can lead to hefty fines, legal actions, or even loss of licenses. Staying compliant helps avoid these risks.
  3. Protecting Reputation: Data breaches, especially in industries dealing with sensitive data, can damage a company’s reputation. Continuous compliance helps protect established trust with customers, partners, and stakeholders.
  4. Reducing Security Risks: Many compliance frameworks are designed to enhance data security. Continuous compliance ensures that a company’s security posture is always up-to-date, reducing the risk of data breaches.
  5. Operational Efficiency: Automated, continuous compliance monitoring can streamline processes, reducing manual audits and interventions, saving time and resources.

For modern businesses, especially those managing sensitive data in the cloud, a continuous compliance strategy is critical to maintaining a secure, efficient, and trusted operation.

Cost Considerations for Compliance Investments

Investing in continuous compliance can lead to significant long-term savings. By maintaining consistent compliance practices, organizations can avoid the hefty fines associated with non-compliance, minimize resource surges during audits, and reduce the impacts of breaches through early detection. Continuous compliance provides security and financial predictability, often resulting in more manageable and predictable expenses.

In contrast, periodic compliance can lead to fluctuating costs. While expenses may be lower between audits, costs typically spike as audit dates approach. These spikes often result from hiring consultants, deploying temporary tools, or incurring overtime charges. Moreover, gaps between audits increase the risk of undetected non-compliance or security breaches, potentially leading to significant unplanned expenses from fines or mitigation efforts.

When evaluating cost implications, it's crucial to look beyond immediate expenses and consider the long-term financial impact. Continuous compliance not only offers a steadier expenditure pattern but also potential savings through proactive measures. On the other hand, periodic compliance can introduce cost variability and financial uncertainties associated with risk management.

Challenges of Continuous Compliance

  1. Keeping Pace with Technological Advancements
    The fast-evolving tech landscape makes compliance a moving target. Organizations need to regularly update their systems to stay in line with new technology, ensuring compliance procedures remain effective. This requires investment in infrastructure that can adapt quickly to these changes. Additionally, keeping up with emerging security risks requires continuous threat detection and response strategies, focusing on real-time monitoring and adaptive security standards to safeguard against new threats.
  2. Data Privacy and Protection Across Borders
    Global organizations face the challenge of navigating multiple, often conflicting, data protection regulations. To maintain compliance, they must implement unified strategies that respect regional differences while adhering to international standards. This includes consistent data sensitivity tagging and secure data storage, transfer, and processing, with measures like encryption and access controls to protect sensitive information.
  3. Internal Resistance and Cultural Shifts
    Implementing continuous compliance often meets internal resistance, requiring effective change management, communication, and education. Building a compliance-oriented culture, where it’s seen as a core value rather than a box-ticking exercise, is crucial.

Organizations must be adaptable, invest in the right technology, and create a culture that embraces compliance. This both helps meet regulatory demands and also strengthens risk management and security resilience.

How You Can Achieve Continuous Compliance With Sentra

First, Sentra automates data discovery and classification and takes a fraction of the time and effort it would take to manually catalog all sensitive data. It’s far more accurate, especially when using a solution that leverages LLMs to classify data with more granularity and rich context.  It’s also more responsive to the frequent changes in your modern data landscape.

Sentra also can automate the process of identifying regulatory violations and ensuring adherence to compliance requirements using pre-built policies that update and evolve with compliance changes (including policies that map to common compliance frameworks). It ensures that sensitive data stays within the correct environments and doesn’t travel to regions in violation of retention policies or without data encryption.

In contrast, manually tracking data inventory is inefficient, difficult to scale, and prone to errors and inaccuracies. This often results in delayed detection of risks, which can require significant time and effort to resolve as compliance audits approach.

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Karin Zano
Karin Zano
October 1, 2024
3
Min Read
Data Security

5 Cybersecurity Tips for Cybersecurity Awareness Month

5 Cybersecurity Tips for Cybersecurity Awareness Month

Secure our World: Cybersecurity Awareness Month 2024

As we kick off October's Cybersecurity Awareness Month and think about this year’s theme, “Secure Our World,” it’s important to remember that safeguarding our digital lives doesn't have to be complex. Simple, proactive steps can make a world of difference in protecting yourself and your business from online threats. In many cases, these simple steps relate to data — the sensitive information about users’ personal and professional lives. As a business, you are largely responsible for keeping your customers' and employees’ data safe. Starting with cybersecurity is the best way to ensure that this valuable information stays secure, no matter where it’s stored or how you use it.

Keeping Personal Identifiable Information (PII) Safe

Data security threats are more pervasive than ever today, with cybercriminals constantly evolving their tactics to exploit vulnerabilities. From phishing attacks to ransomware, the risks are not just technical but also deeply personal — especially when it comes to protecting Personal Identifiable Information (PII).

Cybersecurity Awareness Month is a perfect time to reflect on the importance of strong data security. Businesses, in particular, can contribute to a safer digital environment through Data Security Posture Management (DSPM). DSPM helps businesses - big and small alike -  monitor, assess, and improve their security posture, ensuring that sensitive data, such as PII, remains protected against breaches. By implementing DSPM, businesses can identify weak spots in their data security and take action before an incident occurs, reinforcing the idea that securing our world starts with securing our data.

Let's take this month as an opportunity to Secure Our World by embracing these simple but powerful DSPM measures to protect what matters most: data.

5 Cybersecurity Tips for Businesses

  1. Discover and Classify Your Data: Understand where all of your data resides, how it’s used, and its levels of sensitivity and protection. By leveraging discovery and classification, you can maintain complete visibility and control over your business’s data, reducing the risks associated with shadow data (unmanaged or abandoned data).
  2. Ensure data always has a good risk posture: Maintain a strong security stance by ensuring your data always has a good posture through Data Security Posture Management (DSPM). DSPM continuously monitors and strengthens your data’s security posture (readiness to tackle potential cybersecurity threats), helping to prevent breaches and protect sensitive information from evolving threats.
  3. Protect Private and Sensitive Data: Keep your private and sensitive data secure, even from internal users. By implementing Data Access Governance (DAG) and utilizing techniques like data de-identification and masking, you can protect critical information and minimize the risk of unauthorized access.
  4. Embrace Least-Privilege Control: Control data access through the principle of least privilege — only granting access to the users and systems who need it to perform their jobs. By implementing Data Access Governance (DAG), you can limit access to only what is necessary, reducing the potential for misuse and enhancing overall data security.
  5. Continual Threat Monitoring for Data Protection: To protect your data in real-time, implement continual monitoring of new threats. With Data Detection and Response (DDR), you can stay ahead of emerging risks, quickly identifying and neutralizing potential vulnerabilities to safeguard your sensitive information.

How Sentra Helps Secure Your Business’s World

Today, a business's “world” is extremely complex and ever-changing. Users can easily move, change, or copy data and connect new applications/environments to your ecosystem. These factors make it challenging to pinpoint where your data resides and who has access to it at any given moment. 

Sentra helps by giving businesses a vantage point of their entire data estate, including multi-cloud and on-premises environments. We combine all of the above practices—granular discovery and classification, end-to-end data security posture management, data access governance, and continuous data detection and response into a single platform. To celebrate Cybersecurity Awareness Day, check out how our data security platform can help improve your security posture.

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