IT Solutions Archives - Aditi Group Managed IT & Consulting

Stop Insider Theft & USB Drive-By with Zero Trust

computer service — Mon, 18 Nov 2024 21:02:18 +0000

Remember Physical Data Security

Just like fortified castle defenses, most electronic data security focuses on the internet. Phishing emails, malicious websites, unsavory social media links, public Wifi connections, and weak passwords. All are potentially exploited by data thieves. But what about the old school theft? What about in person physical theft of data?

Stealth Storage in a Pocket

Insider theft and passers-by can too quickly pop in a USB drive and terabytes of data quickly and unnoticed. Storage size and data transfer speed are no longer limitations for would be thieves. Today’s reality is that even USB flash drives aka thumb drives can be found for less than $20 for 2TB of storage!

- USB flash drives
- Portable 2.5″ Solid State drives
- Portable 2.5″ hard disk drives
- USB adapters for M2 SSD sticks
- USB A, B, C
- USB 3.0
- mobile phones

Gone In 60 Seconds?

What About Our Ever Present Phones?

And perhaps most stealth of all…the our ever present mobile phones! Who would notice a cell phone connected to a computer? Likely just a battery recharge right? Maybe it’s more. An iPhone can have to 1TB of storage and many Android phones have large storage AND the ability to add microSD cards for even more.

USB Adapter for M.2 Internal SSD

As high as 4TB of space, blazing fast, and small as a stick of gum!

What’s the Risk? What’s At Stake?

Everything valuable to you and your business.

HIPAA breach of protected health information (PHI). Company proprietary secrets. Customer private financial information, including social security numbers and other items covered by GLBA and consumer privacy laws. Book of business – the clientele that you’ve worked so hard to build up over the years. Embarasing photos or insinuating documents.

Breach of privacy laws can mean massive financial penalties by authorities, lawsuits, and potentially even jail time. And your reputation can flip from trusted authority to careless, untrustworthy people to avoid.

Stealth and Easy Use Enables Theft

USB storage devices – portable drives and mobile phones, enable in-person, local theft of data if they are allowed.

Theft happens in one of three ways:

1. The door is left OPEN – the invitation to take unprotected things
2. An OUTSIDER breaks in – hacking and social engineering
3. Someone INSIDE is the thief – you’re given access as a team member

Zero Trust Solution: Block USB

The heavy handed IT admin’s solution is to simply block all USB ports. No more connecting thumb drives, phones, or portable SSDs and HDDs. Blocking USB drive storage can close an overlooked door that few choose to secure. This follows the assumption that files copied or saved to extneral USB connected drives are suspect and not to be trusted. This closes a real and serious security hole. But it also can create a roadblock to work flow by denying USB connected devices that you WANT. So, really a more nuanced and complex strategy is what most people want. And it is what keeps IT admins from implementing it: complexity.

Let Aditi Zero Trust Do the Work

A much more practical path forward to secure your data, while allowing dyanmic workplaces and convenience is with Aditi Zero Trust. Data storage controls can regulate storage options by specific computer, workgroup, user, or even software program. Our set of tools allows us to deal with all of the complexity of enabling software functionality and workflow that you need while locking down and blocking everything else. Aditi Zero Trust is supported 24/7 and we are able to react to any new requests for software changes within a few minutes. So, you get the best overall security while keeping business flowing smoothly.

The post Stop Insider Theft & USB Drive-By with Zero Trust appeared first on Aditi Group Managed IT & Consulting.

Is Blockchain a Security Savior for Healthcare and Us All?

Cyber Guru — Thu, 03 Nov 2022 19:49:44 +0000

The Goals of Blockchain: Trust and Security

What is Blockchain? Blockchain explained for non-coders

Blockchain is a way of recording that sequentially links every revision of a a record, in a distributed / shared log (or ledger for finance folks). Every transaction is recorded in an every growing record chain.

Featues of Blockchain Records

decentralized digital record ledger
data records (blocks) are tied together in time sequence
any change to a record adds a new block
nothing can be deleted or changed without a record as evidence
“tamper proof”
can be used for any kind of data
distributed network – doesn’t reside on just one computer or desk

Security and Trust

Blockchain brings the promise of trusted data, and impossible…or very low probability of fakes. It can allow a person to own their own data and share it with the world as they choose. Panacea.

Code Is Opportunity

But this is code and electronics. There is always some relative weakness. Code is the realm of hacks.

Crypto hacks have shown that environments where blockchain are used are not unlike other things in the cyber world. Regardless of how trusted or secure a blockchain inidivudal record is, the the application or system it’s used in is vulnerable to the same old cybersecurity problems that befall everyone else.

Two main ways: stolen keys (the passwords), and exploiting bugs in code. Here are some expensive examples:

The Nine Largest Crypto Hacks in 2022

The biggest cryptocurrency hacks of all time

Where is Blockchain Used? Is it Here Yet?

Blockchain is being introduced in the background with the big insurers, banks, pharma, governments, etc. For most of us, we won’t see it or it won’t affect us for a while (some years). Blockchain is really only encoutered by most people who invest in or read about crypto currencies. What blockchain offers crypto is the distributed, trusted accounting that is needed when there is no central bank. It’s the perfect and obvious applicaiton for this new way of tracking transactions.

Healthcare Blockchain & How It’s Used

Blockchain methodology and application are still in the infancy stages for the healthcare industry as a whole. There is an ever increasing number of companies applying blockchain in different ways.

Some create trusted data share groups. These allow us patients – us individuals to own and control our personal medical history records. We can choose who we allow to view and add to our records. And they can’t be tampered with. That’s real power in the hands of the people.

Some healthcare blockchain companies and projects focus on the validation of drug history, DNA info, etc. This is similar to traceability that supply chains are generally concerned with. Knowing the history or the full life path of who touched an item from raw material and out and into the marketplace, is important for controlling quality, safety, and accountability for problems.

Other blockchain tech companies just create data network protocols (the code stuff) or hardware (like crypto currency wallets). These support products and services advance the practicality and usefulness of blockchain in healthcare.

Why Aren’t We All Using Blockchain?

What’s the Holdup? We need trusted, secure solutions today!

The Performance Problem

Blockchains also suffer from a capacity problem. That’s the reason one crypto currency has not really won out yet. Each transaction must be written somewhere. Therefore, the greatest strides have been done through supply chain. Once the object has been delivered, it can be archived or erased. Food is the one application that holds the greatest promise. A head of lettuce grown in a field can be tracked until sold. If a contamination is discovered, tracking to the field, within a farm, can be pulled out of the blockchain in an instant.

Cons for using blockchain are processing speed and resources needed. It can consume a lot of computing power to solve the complex cryptographic equations for validating a record to be added to a chain. For crypto currencies, this is one way you get paid – by “mining” or by computing a new record. It takes time, so fewer transactions per second and computing power and electrical power. Both cost money…real money. : )

Healthcare faces the same limits as currency. People live a long time. Each prescription, procedure, etc. must be kept for the life of the individual. The cloud is not limitless. Everything has a capacity.

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Cybersecurity 2.0 – The Latest on Cyber-Attacks, Ransomware and the Need for Risk Assessments

Security Expert — Fri, 20 May 2022 21:28:53 +0000

Aditi co-founders Ted Mayeshiba and Ted Flittner are interviewed in this lengthy article written by Dorothy Cociu, President of Advanced Benefit Consulting. We invite you to learn more about current computer and phone electronic data security threats and how to avoid some of them.

Highlight Topics Include

Are banking apps safe?
Microsoft Breach by Lapsus$ Hacker Group, March 2022
The risks of using QR codes
Crypto currency
The need for risk assessments – an ongoing security tool

Read the article at Advanced Benefit Consulting

https://advancedbenefitconsulting.com/cybersecurity-2-0-the-latest-on-cyber-attacks-ransomware-and-the-need-for-risk-assessments/

Read the article in the California Broker magazine, June 2022 issue

Read the article in the STATEment May / June 2022 issue

The post Cybersecurity 2.0 – The Latest on Cyber-Attacks, Ransomware and the Need for Risk Assessments appeared first on Aditi Group Managed IT & Consulting.

Separate the Kingdom with a VLAN

computer service — Tue, 21 Apr 2020 23:07:14 +0000

You’re working at home. Only YOU should be able to access the company data. It also crops up in offices with different divisions or departments. Not just anyone and everyone should be able to view, copy, edit or worse, DELETE, the files that don’t pertain to them.

You’ve Gotta Keep ‘Em Separated

We all do it. We are told we should do it. Keep ’em separated. Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket. Keep the hot side hot and cold side cold. We do it in school. We divide groups so that they don’t mix with each other, when it’s really important to keep things pure.

A fundamental tenet of security is to keep minimize access to just those who need it. Health and Human Services tells health providers through HIPAA requirements to give people, including staff, access to the “minimum necessary”.

Why It Matters – Real Life Implications

Dividing computers or workers from each other into groups is a way to minimize the risk that the wrong people view data they shouldn’t. It also keeps people from altering data they shouldn’t. And it one of the strongest ways of keeping hackers from getting access to the whole kingdom once they get through one tiny crack in the wall.

Reflecting back on some of the largest data breaches on record, we see a common pattern. Hackers get access to one computer. Then they move out and over to other computers and shared devices – file folders, data bases, etc. Target’s breach of 70 million credit card users that took place on Black Friday is a poignant example of hackers getting to one computer and moving up, over, and into other data systems. Ultimately from one computer at a subcontract air conditioning service company into the Target financial systems.

Separate Physical Networks

Physical Local Area Network (LAN)

Easy enough to imagine a large office building with different networks that employees log into. Sure. Big offices often have numerous file servers. And the most basic method for keeping things split art is to hard wire the network cables that connect each computer to a specific server. Physical separation makes sense and is easy to understand. But it’s not always the most practical.

Virtual Networks

Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN)

What Does Virtual Network Mean?

Virtual networks share the same physical network connections – same wires, same routers and switches. But they are kept separate through software. Sophisticated server software, now routine for big businesses, allow networks to be created virtually. Once done, users on one VLAN have no ability to connect with users on another VLAN. They’re kept apart even though they use the same hardware.

Isn’t That the Same As My Home Guest Network?

No. Yes. Maybe. Sort of. It depends on details of the router and how the networks are set up on the router. Most “Guest” networks are not functioning as separate VLANs. In most cases, guest network users have the same resource access as primary network users. And everyone is on the same domain and ultimately, hackers can move from Guest to the Ring doorbell, Alexa or your computer with the family financial portfolio on it.

A guest network puts into place an ACL (access control list) that prohibits users from that SSID from accessing any network that is private.
10.x.x.x/8, 192.168.x.x/16, or 172.16.x.x/12

2.4GHz, 5GHz, and Guest WiFi Networks

Your 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz primary and “guest” network settings on that router from AT&T, Cox, Spectrum or Comcast all tie to the same “Home” network. Depending on the router make and model, your Guest WifFi network could be set by default (factory settings) to only allow internet traffic, and not to allow it to share other Home network resources. So, for the casual user, it means they can’t see your IP camera or your printer. But advanced users and hackers can scan other addresses on the network and get access.

Separation with VLAN and Managed Switches

A Managed Switch is the piece of hardware that allows us to create virtual or logical separate groups. A managed switch is not the same as a Router. A Router is a Layer 3 network device and it connects the outside world – the internet – with the devices inside.

Get Your VLAN at Home

VLANs can be developed with more advanced network components than the typical home parts. Combine a Managed Switch with a wireless access point (AP) and you’ve got the hardware for creating a true VLAN. You don’t need an expensive 48-port commercial grade managed switch, but you do want a managed switch. And APs like Ubiquity offers are more what you’re looking for instead of your typical WiFi-Router. It does take more time to setup and learn, but the results are real network security and real separation of resources.

Separate Kids, Parents Personal, and Business

The real security pay-off is in creating separate areas where kids can user the internet with their bad judgement and ask-questions-later enthusiasm for web surfing. You can create KIDS, PARENTS, and WORK networks and truly keep them separated.

Professional Guidance

Aditi Group can provide the hardware and installation and setup of home and small business networks including VLANs, VPNs, Firewalls, and more. Call us if you need help keeping your business secure for your Work At Home office.

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