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Sat, June 26, 2021

Security Hygiene: The First Line of Security

By Mike Rothman

After many decades as security professionals, it’s depressing to keep seeing the same issues and mistakes. It feels like we’re stuck in hacker Groundhog Day. Get up, clean up the mistakes made by users or administrators, handle a new attack, and fill out compliance reports, only to have to do it all over again the next day.

The most basic advice we give anyone building a security program is to make sure you handle the fundamentals well. You remember security fundamentals, right?

Things like ensuring visibility for every asset, and maintaining a strong security configuration and posture for those assets. You also need to patch systems efficiently and effectively when vendors issue updates.

In this Security Hygiene: The First Line of Security paper, we’ll provide a reminder as to the importance of the fundamentals and present a process to ensure you can fix issues efficiently and effectively.

Our research is licensed by companies that understand the need to keep their communities not just at the cutting edge of technology, but to do it securely. We thank our friends at Oracle for licensing this report. Our research is done using our Totally Transparent research methodology. This allows us to do impactful research while protecting our integrity.

Download the paper (PDF).

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