Best Practices for Maintaining IT Security
Maintaining an effective IT security network requires ongoing effort and commitment. By following these best practices, organisations can ensure the integrity, availability, and confidentiality of their critical business data:
1. Regularly Update Software and Security Patches
Software vendors regularly release updates and patches to address vulnerabilities and enhance security. Organisations should implement a patch management process to ensure all systems and software are up to date. This includes operating systems, applications, and firmware used within the IT network.
2. Perform Regular Vulnerability Assessments
Vulnerability assessments help identify potential weaknesses within the IT network. Organisations should conduct regular assessments to identify vulnerabilities and prioritise remediation efforts. This includes scanning for known vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, or weak security practices.
3. Implement Strong Password Policies
Weak passwords are a significant vulnerability in IT security networks. Organisations should enforce strong password policies, requiring users to choose complex passwords and regularly change them. Additionally, implementing multi-factor authentication provides an extra layer of security beyond passwords.
4. Back-Up Data Regularly
Data backups are crucial for recovery in the event of a security incident or system failure. Organisations should regularly back up critical business data and verify the integrity of the backups. Offsite backups or cloud-based solutions provide additional protection against physical damage or loss.
5. Monitor Network Traffic and User Activities
Continuous monitoring of network traffic and user activities enables early detection of potential security incidents. Implementing security information and event management (SIEM) systems allows organisations to centralise and analyse log data, identify anomalies, and respond promptly to suspicious activities.
6. Develop an Incident Response Plan
An incident response plan outlines the steps to be taken in the event of a security incident. It should define roles and responsibilities, establish communication channels, and provide a framework for containing and mitigating the impact of an incident. Regular testing and updating of the incident response plan are essential to ensure its effectiveness.
7. Enforce multi-factor authentication everywhere it will go
If you do only one thing on this list, do this one. The overwhelming majority of intrusions we are called to investigate begin with a valid credential rather than an exploit, and multi-factor authentication is what breaks that path.
The detail that matters is coverage. MFA on the corporate email tenancy but not on the VPN, the remote desktop gateway, the administrative consoles or the SaaS platforms leaves the door you cared about locked and the one beside it open. Start with anything internet-facing and anything privileged, and prefer phishing-resistant methods over SMS codes where the platform supports them.
8. Restrict administrative privileges
Most organisations have more administrators than they think, accumulated over years of “just for this project”. Every one of them is a route from a single phished account to the whole environment.
Three practical steps: inventory who holds privileged access today, separate day-to-day accounts from administrative ones so nobody browses the web as a domain administrator, and review the list on a schedule rather than when someone remembers.
9. Test what you have built
Every item above is a control you believe is working. Independent testing is how you find out whether that belief is accurate, and it is the step most often skipped because the controls look fine from the inside.
It is also increasingly required rather than optional. ISO 27001 expects technical compliance to be evaluated. APRA CPS 234 requires systematic testing of control effectiveness, with the frequency justified against how fast your environment changes and how critical the assets are. SOC 2 auditors ask whether testing was performed and what happened to the findings.
Where to start if all nine look daunting
Do not try to do them at once. The ACSC’s Essential Eight already sequences most of this list into a maturity model, and it is free. Working out where you sit against it gives you a defensible order of work and a way to report progress that an executive, an auditor and an insurer will all recognise.
One caution when you measure yourself: your Essential Eight maturity is the lowest of the eight strategies, not the average. Money spent on your weakest strategy moves the number. Money spent polishing your strongest does not.
Siege Cyber’s cyber security maturity assessment gives you a scored baseline and a costed plan to lift it. Get a Fixed-Price Quote.