Tips to Protect Your Endpoint From Potential Threats

Cybersecurity is a problem for everyone in today’s digital environment, including individuals, SMEs, and MNCs. The COVID-19 pandemic has further increased the number of cybercrime incidents, which were already rising steadily. Weaponized AI, a rise in remote workers, and an increased reliance on technology in business operations have made businesses worldwide more vulnerable to cyberattacks than ever. (endpoint security Malaysia) 

Businesses need to start safeguarding their digital systems and operations to stay safe well into the future, especially with the average cost of cybercrime expected to rise from an estimated 300 billion in 2013 to 945 billion in 2020. As more businesses move to cloud and IoT services, which can streamline and make corporate operations much more effective and more vulnerable to cybercrime, it is no longer an option to ignore the realities of cyber security and overlook the necessary protection measures.

However, the cost of cybercrime goes beyond merely financial loss. Due to these attacks, firms that appeared to be stable and prosperous have had to declare bankruptcy due to high opportunity costs, business interruption, reputational damage, and many other factors. Despite these worrying statistics, up to 50% of organisations claimed they lacked an incident response mechanism. Any organisation aiming for development and success in a post-pandemic environment must ensure that it is effectively protected and secured from cybercrime, starting with endpoint security Malaysia.

What exactly is endpoint security?

In its simplest form, endpoint security is safeguarding endpoints against unauthorised access, misuse, modification, or destruction by malware-using hackers. Any device with network access within your company is an endpoint. This might be any device your company or workers utilise for business purposes, such as a computer, phone, printer, router, and more.

Why is endpoint security important for businesses? 

The contemporary period has provided a wide range of technological advancements and advantages. However, employees can now access company data from their endpoints and occasionally from networks unrelated to their jobs. One of the most excellent methods to stop cyber security assaults and spare your company from possibly millions of dollars in losses, if not more, is to secure all the endpoints that have access to essential business data.

Best Practices for Securing APIs

If enterprises want to publish their APIs publicly, they must follow some fundamental security best practices and use tried-and-true security measures.

Put security first.

Security for APIs shouldn’t be neglected or viewed as “someone else’s concern.” Make safety a priority and incorporate it into your APIs as you develop them since organisations stand to lose a lot if they use unsafe APIs. 

Manage your API inventory. 

No matter how many publicly accessible APIs a company has, it must first be aware of them to secure and manage them. Unexpectedly, many are not. Work with DevOps teams to manage your APIs after conducting perimeter scans to find and inventory them.

Use a reliable solution for authentication and authorization. 

One of the biggest problems with many publicly accessible APIs is weak or nonexistent authentication and authorisation. Broken authentication occurs when an authentication factor (something the client knows, has, or is) can be readily cracked into or when APIs do not enforce authentication (as is frequently the case with private APIs, which are intended for internal use only). It’s crucial that an organisation rigorously restricts access to APIs because they serve as a gateway to its databases. Use OAuth2.0 and OpenID Connect-based solutions based on reliable, tested authentication and authorisation techniques whenever possible.

Use the least privilege principle. 

This fundamental security principle states that the minimal access required for a topic (people, processes, programmes, systems, or devices) to perform a declared purpose should be granted. APIs should be subject to the same rules.

Encrypt traffic using TLS. 

While some organisations may decide not to encrypt API payload data that is regarded as non-sensitive (for example, weather service data), TLS encryption should be seen as necessary for organisations whose APIs frequently exchange sensitive data (such as login credentials, credit cards, social security, banking information, and health information).

Remove information that’s not meant to be shared. 

Since APIs are essentially developer tools, they frequently include keys, passwords, and other data that must be removed before making it available to the general public. But occasionally, this action is disregarded. Organisations should include scanning tools into their DevSecOps procedures to reduce unintentional disclosure of sensitive information.

Don’t expose more data than necessary.

Some APIs give away way too much information, whether in the form of an excessive amount of irrelevant data or information that gives away too much about the API endpoint. This often happens when an API assigns the responsibility of data filtering to the user interface rather than the endpoint. Make sure APIs only return the data required to perform their intended function. Additionally, if the response contains confidential data, obfuscate it and implement data access constraints at the API level.

Conclusion 

Building modern applications, particularly for mobile and Internet of Things (IoT) devices, has arguably shifted to using APIs. Although bringing data into a programme from an external source is not new, some organisations might not yet be aware of the possible risks associated with making their APIs publicly available due to the rapidly changing app development methodologies and the need to innovate. The good news is that obtaining them is not particularly mysterious. Most businesses currently have defences against well-known threats that might target APIs, like distributed denial-of-service, cross-site scripting, and injection. And seasoned security experts are probably familiar with many of the best practices described above. If unsure where to start, work down the list from the top. Your organisation’s ultimate goal should be to build strong API security standards and manage them pro-actively throughout time, regardless of how many APIs it decides to offer publicly.  

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