National Cybersecurity Awareness Month is coming to a close. Whether you have participated in the initiative or just read about it for the first time, please consider the importance of this government sponsored campaign. Over the last four weeks we have asked hard questions about cyber security. These included questions about your persona, and words you should avoid in defense of a cybersecurity breach. In the end, the point is to correct the mistakes we are making, and to educate those that are unaware of the problems around them. As a parting thought, please consider these top 19 (plus one) recommendations everyone should take away from this month (in no specific order). Doing these cybersecurity basics will help everyone just stay more secure:
- Use standard user accounts and not administrative privileges for daily work
- Never share passwords
- Never reuse passwords
- Never store passwords in clear text
- Securely document and store passwords
- Minimize the number of account aliases
- Minimize the number administrative and root accounts
- Rotate passwords frequently
- Ensure passwords meet complexity requirements
- Require multifactor authentication when appropriate
- Implement application whitelisting
- Enforce the principle of least privilege
- Automate password management
- Eliminate hardcoded passwords
- Deploy adaptive access controls
- Monitor session activity to sensitive systems
- Understand obligations for compliance
- Monitor user behavior
- Segment your network
- If you are NOT having fun, you should get a different job (19+ plus one)
