In a world that’s increasingly interconnected and interdependent, many companies are moving to a zero trust security strategy in an effort to defend against malicious attacks. Especially in the logistics space, it is becoming increasingly clear that security needs to be strengthened.
What Is Zero Trust Security?
Zero trust security gets its name from the simple idea that sometimes, you can trust no one. That is, there is zero trust.
Think about it: our logistics networks are increasingly international and interdependent. Imagine what it’s like trying to keep a company’s IT department up and running when so many people work from home, have bad passwords, or simply quit their jobs in favor of better opportunities. How do you keep a company secure in that kind of environment?
When you scale those risks up to a global level and then apply them to logistics companies, things can get pretty scary really quickly. Zero trust security is the way forward.
More than the Perimeter
Zero trust security goes much further than investing everything you’ve got in your firewall. It used to be that if you had a password for a company’s network, you had access to anything on the company’s network. The days of a company having only a moat, wall, and gate are long gone.
Now users have to provide credentials through multi-factor authentication for every layer of intelligence at the firm they’re working for. Zero trust security means there’s not just a wall, a gate, and a moat; there’s a guard at every door checking passwords and even whether users have a legitimate reason to be there.
Better Protection with Zero Trust Security
Zero trust security is simply a response to increased hacker and malware attacks in the past few years. IT professionals have realized that they’ve effectively been giving away the keys to the company for far too long.
The fact is, most people on the company network don’t even need access to the majority of it. Most employees simply need access to the data and applications they need to do their job — that’s it, and nothing more.
A big problem with giving complete access to all users is that any user’s profile can be used to gain access to all of it. And that’s actually pretty lax security.
Changing Mindsets
It’s not easy to change the way people think. But this is one of those moments when keeping logistics networks up and running means thinking things through a little differently. It’s not a bad thing for digital users to be required to demonstrate their need-to-know and authenticate identity, especially in sensitive areas.
This setup all means, frankly, training people — not just about new security measures but to recognize when their company is being attacked.
Phishing
All it takes is for one person among the hundreds or perhaps thousands of users in a company’s email system to click on the wrong email, and boom: the whole network goes down. Or worse, attackers gain access to the firm’s email database, which would naturally contain a lot of sensitive data. Prevention is far better than cure.
Printers
A lot of people don’t think about it, but printers on the network are a huge vulnerability point that hackers tend to love. The printer is connected to every workstation on the network, and its queue is chock full of documents that could be downloaded and used maliciously. These avenues of approach cannot be left open.
Assuming the Worst
The essence of the new zero trust mindset is to protect more than just your company’s network. You want to protect all its assets by assuming every query from every workstation is malicious. Zero trust asks you to prove you’re a friend before it treats you like one.
Zero Trust Means Stronger Supply Chains
Supply chains will be more robust using this type of beefed-up security. With zero trust security in place, business partners will also enjoy the benefits until the whole supply chain is positively affected.
R2 Logistics is your go-to solution for enabling zero trust architecture. Contact us today.