Security | Threat Detection | Cyberattacks | DevSecOps | Compliance

Secure Office 365 with PowerShell via the CIS approach - Pt 2

This is the second blog in a multi part series helping admins, service providers, consultants and security admins to check and achieve a level of security control in Office 365. Part 1 of this series covered the basic PowerShell commands for Authentication through CIS, here we will talk about ‘Audit’.

Why MSPs Should not Apply MFA Solutions Blindly

Microsoft engineers shared that 99.9% of compromised accounts forgot to turn on MFA. Despite so many warnings and proof of the efficacy of MFA, an M365 security report by Coreview reveals that 78% of M365 administrators do not have MFA activated. Isn't that crazy? It's not always perfect (phishing, social engineering and password brute-force attacks, device theft etc.); nevertheless, it is clearly better than not having it. However, if not implemented with care, it can create headaches for MSPs.

MSP Business Scalability Challenge for Office 365 Security

If we look at the industry report, the Managed Services Market is forecast to touch USD 557.10 billion by 2028. It has become a mature business now, however the customers' needs are highly complex when compared to traditional businesses. MSP Business opportunity/challenges can be complex to navigate, often involving multiple external market forces, internal drivers, organisational and client-based frictions, resistance to scaling, and of course, both financial and opportunity costs.

Desired State Configuration without Managing PowerShell Code

Back in 2008, Microsoft added a new technology to PowerShell and named it Desired State Configuration or DSC. In essence, DSC is the framework that delivers and gives the user tools to maintain configuration. Desired State Configuration allows you to define your environment’s aspired state with a simple declarative syntax that has been added into the PowerShell script. It is then assigned to each target server in your environment.

Secure & Manage Office 365 with PowerShell - The CIS Approach

Office 365 is central to your business needs and business continuity. However, it exposes a large (maybe even the largest) risk surface in your organisation. It is, therefore, crucial to secure it enough to mitigate this ever-present and continuous risk but keep it open enough to ensure as fluid a business as possible. Getting this balance right is difficult, and it can be hard to know where to start. Adopting a common security standard can be a great place.

Baseline Security (Posture) Monitoring is the New Breach Monitoring

As part of the 2021 MSP 500 project, CRN asked MSPs to describe their most significant challenges for 2021. Their answers ranged from 'finding and hiring highly trained new employees' to 'fulfilling clients' sophisticated IT security needs whilst sustaining business in the saturated MSP market.' In 2021 the cybersecurity threats have taken different shades and have compelled the MSPs to refine and increase their security offering to stay relevant and thriving in the market.

NIST Cybersecurity Framework for Office 365

‍With more than a decade long history of businesses adopting cloud computing, less than one-third of the enterprises have a documented cloud strategy as per Gartner's estimation. Despite the increased migration to cloud security, we discussed the top cloud security risks that security experts are afraid of today.

Zero Trust Model for Cloud Security

(Guest Blog) For decades, companies have relied on perimeter protection solutions to restrict their digital resources. These included passwords to authenticate users, intrusion detection systems and firewalls. With time, passwords became inadequate in preventing unauthorized access, and most shifted to two-factor authentication systems like one-time SMS codes or tokens. This change significantly enhanced security, but the approach only focused on securing the perimeter.

Public vs Private Cloud Security: A Simple Explanation

(Guest Post) There is no worse feeling than the heartache you get after recording your child’s milestones, only for the mobile phone to start warning that the internal storage is running low. Or maybe you cannot function without music, and you have been downloading so many songs that both your internal storage and memory card are full. Most people would rush to delete some of the songs, but you should not have to decide between two of your favourite artists because you are not one of them.

Security Trends for Managed IT Service Providers

The global managed security services market was valued at $19.4 billion in 2017 and is forecast to reach $46.1 billion by 2023 at a CAGR of 14.9%. There has been an upward trend seen in the need for threat-intelligence by several sectors today. Due to an increased requirement to fight against the advanced threat landscape, customers today expect managed IT service providers and MSPs to adopt advanced security technologies to detect better and anticipate potential threats well in time.