In the first part of our series on Zero Trust we discussed its pillars and principles and why it is beneficial to your organization. Today, we explore the fundamental best practises to implement a Zero Trust security model and the elements of a Zero Trust maturity model to help assess your Zero Trust readiness.
In the first week of October, we discussed data, which is the very reason why your organization should be implementing a Zero Trust strategy. If you haven’t yet had a read, you can find the blog here.
So, you understand what Zero Trust is though you’re not quite sure how to implement it across your organization?
Read on to find out the 7 simple steps you can take to make your organizational workforce Zero Trust proof.
Implementing a Zero Trust Strategy
A Zero Trust approach should extend throughout the entire digital estate and serve as an integrated security philosophy and end-to-end strategy. This is done by implementing Zero Trust controls and technologies across the six defense areas we mentioned last week. Just in case you need a refresher these Zero Trust defense areas are:
- Identities
- Endpoints
- Applications
- Networks
- Infrastructure
- Data
7 Steps to Implement a Zero Trust Strategy
- Asset Inventory and Vulnerability Management. The first step is to complete a total audit of each defense and to understand how secure each of these defense areas are, as each are independently a resource to be defended. Once an asset inventory review has been completed then your organization can understand what and to what extent technical and organizational measures need to put in place.
- Identity and Access. Configure Zero Trust identity and device access protection. This is continuous verification, visibility, and validation of least-privileged access, which includes; Passwordless access, multi-factor-authentication (MFA) with conditional access that considers user account risk, device status, and other criteria and policies that your organization creates.
- Intelligent Endpoint Protection. After enrolling devices into management via Microsoft’s Intune, you can implement more sophisticated controls and therefore better secure your data/information (Microsoft 2022). This is key to modernizing your workforce as work environments are now hybrid, across borders and multi-functional
- Logical and Physical Segmentation. In a Zero Trust approach, networks should be segmented. Segmentation helps minimize the blast radius, isolating the damage of any potential breaches that may occur within your network to a smaller surface area.
- Continuous Monitoring and Incident Response. Steps 2-4 must be continuously monitored for the complete security across your IT network. In doing so, it is likely that you will uncover potential threats, which means your organization must have an intelligent incident response plan that will mitigate these threats promptly. These must align with regulatory requirements due to data protection laws and company insurances.
- Data Governance and Business Continuity Plan. Develop a data governance plan to ensure your valuable organizational information is secured whilst minimizing risk and costs to the business. It is imperative that your organization can still operate and has a robust strategy to ensure its operation in the event of an attack which is why a business continuity plan is essential.
- Awareness and Adoption. This includes creating company policies that all employees understand and implement within the organization. Implementing the Zero Trust security model takes a consistent approach and effort across all internal stakeholders which implies that a level of change management may need to be considered. Once implemented, Zero Trust needs to be measured and assessed against how ready your organization is ‘Zero Trust ready’. That is where the Zero Trust maturity model comes in, read on to find out more.
Maturity Model
While a Zero Trust security model is most effective when integrated across the entire digital estate, most organizations will need to take a phased approach that targets specific areas for change based on their Zero Trust maturity, available resources, and priorities. The Zero Trust maturity model helps you to assess what stage your organization is in to better manage expectations and change across the organization.
Take a closer look at the image below to better understand what this means:
Introducing ZTaaS
Implementing a Zero Trust strategy can be rather overwhelming and can take a considerable amount of time and effort across all business units within your organization. What If you could have your entire digital estate Zero Trust proofed with ease and totally transformed to increase data protection, minimize your organizational risk and ultimately modernize your workforce seamlessly? That is exactly what we are doing at Aegis Innovators.
We have spent countless hours as a team to create an optimal service for our clients, you, that breaks down Zero Trust into specific and intelligent segments that makes the deployment process seamless and stress-free for your organization.
We have called it ZTaaS! Or Zero Trust as a Service, with packages that suit your organization’s needs.
We make Zero Trust, fun, easy and affordable whilst ensuring your workforce and work environment is protected, productive and modernized in this dynamic digital landscape.
More information to come on ZTaaS next month.
To learn more about what we do visit our website. Alternatively, if you want to get straight to implementing the Zero Trust model into your organization then Book a time with Matt.
