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How Government Institution Can Prevent Cyber Attacks

· Cyber Security

In October 2018, according to the Center for Medicine and Medicaid services, hackers accessed a government computer system and hacked personal accounts of about 75000 people. In the same month, the Ukrainian security service announced an attempted hacking of information and telecom systems and this is just the tip of the iceberg!

Numerous examples exist where cybercriminals have accessed government organizations! In light of the increased cyber threats and heightened tensions in global cybersecurity, what was first a minor inconvenience has turned into criminal activity with repercussions that reach out globally which is why government institutions like all other institutions has seen an increased demand for cybersecurity!

Increasingly sophisticated threats have made way for more advanced techniques to prevent cyber attacks like behaviour analytics and big data analytics in order to help organisations fight off cybercrime and to protect critical data. This article aims to highlight some ways government institutions can work to secure their data.

prevent cyber attacks

How Government Can Help Prevent Cyber Attacks

Here are three ways government institutions can work to prevent cyber attacks!

Implement An Incident Response Plan

An incident response plan lays out the plan that needs to be followed in the case of occurrence of a security event or breach. It is an all-encompassing plan that includes tactics and roles and responsibilities that involve everyone in the organisation.

Its common knowledge that a good defence the best offence, and organisations can help themselves immensely by preventing attacks before they even occur.

For Those government organisations that have access to confidential and sensitive data, knowledge about the most critical and confidential data, where it lies and the mechanism needed to protect it in case an attack occurs can contribute significantly towards the maintenance of effective security.

Time is critical when it comes to cybersecurity and crimes which is why it is important that they be prepared ahead of time in order to recover faster!

Incident response plans should be consistently revised owing to the dynamic nature of the threat landscape. Past events are important for implementing lessons and working out the thought process of hackers can go a long way when contributing towards the incident response plans for the future.

The Talent Gap And A Need For The Right People

According to a study, around 3.5 million jobs in the field of cybersecurity will become unfilled, an increase from 1 million in 2017, meaning that an investment in talent in the field of cybersecurity, and the recognition and the importance of employees skilled in the world of cyber threats.

As high salaries and benefits become available for employees in the private sector, government organisations will be facing competition as more employees opt for higher salaries and incentives.

The presence of a team qualified to provide proper cyber security helps government organisations minimise the response time in case of cyber threats, and it also works to fortify the cyber stronghold protecting government data.

Use Of Sophisticated Technology

The talent gap can be compensated, and the cybersecurity plans in the case of threat can be automated and simplified by the use of ground breaking technology and methodologies to prevent cyber attacks. The effective use of revolutionary methodologies like behavioral analytics not only increases the accuracy of detection and provides more accurate data for security agents to work with and to make decisions, decreasing the response time.

The technologies used have the ability to work continually correlate, collect and understand data from various sources, while identifying the behaviour of new threats, and to work with security tools in an attempt to contain warnings.

Automated functions have the ability to help security professionals respond to the threats timely, extract information that is needed and to allow a reduction in the time and manual labour it takes to identify and work against a threat.

Behavioural Analytics In Government Institutions

Behavioural analytics works by using software tools to determine and detect patterns that are out of the norm in data transmissions. Analytic tools detect any anomalies, alerting managers that work against the threat in order to prevent it from damaging data.

Government enterprises use behavioural analytics to discern any attempts to access systems that surpass technologies that specialise in preventing such attempts eg, firewalls and antivirus programs. Although the conventional tools are used widely, their ability to work against threats is limited. They work by using the signatures and footprints used in any past attacks leaving new threats to wander through our data.

Behavioral analytics not only studies data but also compare them to a baseline of normal activity. The technology is being used by Organizations like National Security Agency that has also resorted to the use of advanced detection system to prevent their crucial data.

Conclusion

Behavioural analytics used alone may not provide the comprehensive protection required to prevent cyber attacks on critical organisation data. Pairing such advanced techniques with an incident response plan and the right people for the job can help eliminate any threats and respond to them before they manage to damage data and reputation of government organizations.

If you’re an enterprise working towards securing your cyber perimeters, opt for some of the best security providers and rest assured that your data is in safe hands!

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