Network Security
Network Security consists of various policies and devices to manage access to and from your internal networks. While it is true that the most secure network is a network that has no outside connection, this is not a feasible approach. With demand for corporate resource access from outside of your physical location increases, so does your exposure to the internet. It is paramount to take the necessary steps to protect your corporate resources from threats, both external and internal.
Threats come in various different forms, which means implemented protection strategies have to be able to protect you from a number of different threats. The term Network Security is a broad definition of tools, devices and expertise your organization needs to defend itself from such threats.
Due to the rise of cyber threats and damage they can cause, security awareness and IT Security budgets companies allocate are also rising.
Network Security is now a priority for most companies.
According to 2019 Security Report of Check Point
Firewall, IPS, VPN
Firewall: One of the key elements for Network Security; enables you to control the flow of your network. Firewall by itself is simply a traffic control tool, either allowing or denying incoming or outgoing traffic.
Intrusion Prevention System (IPS): Protects the corporate network from known threats, as well as provide the network with geo-protection capabilities and protection against protocol anomalies. The main role of IPS is to identify attacks, stop them and report them.
Virtual Private Network (VPN): Allows secure access to corporate resources over a non-secure network (Internet). There are two distinct types of VPN, one being Client-to-Site VPN, and the other Site-to-Site VPN. Client-to-Site VPN is used to connect a specific user to the corporate network, while Site-to-Site VPN connects one or more offices together.
Content Filtering
Content Filtering: also known as information filtering, is applied to user and application web access throughout the corporate network. With content filtering, it is possible to inspect, block and limit web traffic of a user, group of users or an application. Alongside with applying a corporate web access policy, content filtering can help protect against malicious internet activity. Since the use of SSL traffic became the norm, many content filtering appliances / software have some kind of SSL Inspection / HTTPS Inspection technology built-in.
DDoS Protection
DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) and DoS (Denial of Service) attacks are targeted attacks that purposefully aim to render the target system inaccessible and / or inoperable for a period of time. These attacks are relatively easy to initiate, and without proper protection against them, can cause loss of revenue for the company.
With the notable increase in DDoS and DoS attacks in the last few years, being prepared for this type of attack is simply another necessity. DDoS protection solutions are able to recognize the abnormal traffic, and separate it from normal network flow.
Gateway Security
While Endpoint security solutions offer you endpoint protection at endpoint level, stopping a threat before it even enters your internal network will help you secure your network.
Gateway protection offers the following benefits:
Anti-Virus – Protection against viruses, malware and spyware right at the gateway level before malware enters your network.
Anti-Spam – Protection against e-mail based threats, including viruses, spam, phishing etc. at the gateway level before unwanted /malicious mail reaches your mail server.
Sandboxing – Security mechanism that executes programs in a virtual, isolated environment and analyzes it heuristically. Protects against unknown threats and zero-day attacks at gateway level
Wireless Security
Securing wireless networks are harder than securing a wired network. Wireless networks are not secure as wired ones. Uncontrolled and unmonitored wireless network can expose your internal network / resources to unauthorized parties.
For corporate wireless networks, secure certificate based authentication mechanism such 802.1x / Active Directory Authentication should be implemented to ensure that only authorized users can access to the network.