We have entered a new decade and it won’t be wrong to state the new decade has brought with itself several new ways of managing and operating a business. Most of the organizations are operating remotely to steer through the new normal and maintain business continuity.
These new remote working models have created multiple endpoints in data chains, providing cyber attackers not one, but multiple access points to an IT infrastructure’s nucleus - data.
It is not surprising to note that, as per The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeITY), till August 2020, almost 7 lakh cyber-attacks were faced by Indian citizens, commercial and legal entities.
Hackers and cyber-criminals are always on the look for new methods of entry, one of which is below the PC operating system.
Low-level attacks often take advantage of weak system configurations and firmware vulnerabilities. While many of these attacks may not be as sensational as ransomware, they can be even more devastating.
Considering these threats and that organizations’ security parameter is expanding beyond the traditional four walls into their employees’ homes, here are five fundamentals one should keep in mind from a cyber security perspective:
Protect devices above and below the operating system (OS) - In addition to having modern solutions in place to prevent unknown threats and respond quickly and efficiently to attacks across the endpoint, network and cloud, you must also choose devices that have protection and detection capabilities below the OS at the PC BIOS level, where we’re seeing a significant rise of attacks. The PC BIOS lives deep inside the PC and controls core functions like booting the PC.