Cybercrime in Australia on the rise – Part 2
EducationalSecurity

Cybercrime in Australia on the rise – Part 2

By 16/11/2023 No Comments

October was cyber security awareness month and cybercrime in Australia is on the rise! 

In my prior blog post, I provided a concise review of the Australian Signal Directorate’s (ASD) recent annual cyber security report and unfortunately it wasn’t full of good news. Cybercrime in Australia is on the rise.

In this blog I’ll provide with some information that’ll help you protect your business and provide you with the confidence to continue operating in cyberspace. 

As businesses become more reliant on operating in cyberspace, they also must become more agile to responding to how malicious actors may try and exploit vulnerabilities, however according to Microsoft, basic security hygiene will prevent 99% of attacks! 

Infographic: basic security hygiene still protects against 99% of attacks

Figure 1: Microsoft Infographic – Basic security hygiene still protects against 99% of attacks

The above infographic demonstrates what is considered basic security hygiene by Microsoft. All of these features are included within the Microsoft 365 Business Premium, are actively implemented by MODEX and mostly operate in the background without interrupting your staff’s day-to-day work. 

1

Multifactor Authentication (MFA)

A unique username and unique password is great and can present a challenge to some malicious actors however if this is cracked your whole account is exposed immediately. Adding a secondary form of authentication will significantly improve your account security. This secondary form of authentication usually comes in the shape a phone number, or an authenticator app attached to the user.
2

Applying Zero Trust Principles

A zero trust model is a proactive approach to security that applies several principles. They are Assume breach, explicitly verify and use least privilege access. This means assume that attackers can and will successfully attack anything (identity, network, device, app and/or infrastructure), ensure that users and devices are in a good state before allowing access and only allowing the privilege that is needed for access to a resource and no more.
3

Use extended detection and response and anti-malware

Implementation of software to detect and automatically block attacks, Microsoft 365 has Defender which can provide all these capabilities across the entire the M365 ecosystem.
4

Keeping up to date

Unpatched and out of date systems are a key reason many organisations fall victim to an attack. Ensure all systems are kept up to date including firmware, the operating system, and applications.

If these basic cyber security hygiene principles are implemented in your current IT environment then you can begin to feel confident that your business is secure from 99% of all cyber attacks. 

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