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Fortinet CISO Perspectives

SUNNYVALE, Calif. - Jun 18, 2020

Early adopters, while lauding the benefits of an SD-WAN strategy, quickly ran into a number of critical challenges early on. Implementing an SD-WAN solution isn’t always as easy as it looks. SD-WAN solutions designed for one use case, say, connecting branch offices located in a specific metro area, don’t always translate to other use cases, such as then trying to support a global deployment.

The rapid embrace of digital innovation has made networks and network security much more complex—and vulnerable. While malicious cyberattacks remain a serious problem, 48% of all breaches last year came from benign sources that could have been prevented.1 Moreover, 75% of network outages and performance issues are the result of misconfiguration error.2 In this regard, a network security strategy that prioritizes network automation can help reduce one of the leading causes of cyber risk and downtime—human error and misconfigurations.

From a security perspective, however, cloud environments could also expand the potential attack surface if the proper cloud security isn’t in place. Public clouds, for example, can represent a unique risk because many organizations do not have the experience or expertise needed to secure these unique environments. According to one recent Gartner report, “Through 2025, 99% of cloud security failures will be the customer’s fault.”

Even advanced threats still rely heavily on social engineering

During the COVID-19 pandemic, testing is essential to monitoring and controlling the spread of the virus. This is especially true in metropolitan areas, where the population density makes efforts such as social distancing more difficult.

With 71% of ransomware attacks targeting small-to-medium sized businesses (SMBs),1 it continues to be the prevailing form of malware used by attackers to disrupt organizations. The rapid adoption of new digital innovations often introduces new security gaps and makes it easier for attacks to spread across the flat and open internal network. For many, the loss of critical business cycles and revenues from systems that have ground to a halt far outweighs the price of the ransom itself. The Fortinet Security Fabric provides comprehensive network security and advanced threat-intelligence sharing to help SMBs detect and protect against ransomware attacks.

As organizations suddenly find themselves responding to a massive increase in remote workers, immediate attention has necessarily been focused on maintaining and enhancing VPN infrastructure. We should also keep in mind, however, that VPNs are not the only way to enable remote workers to access critical line-of-business functions. Web applications have a vital role to play in our business resiliency plans as well.

Across industries, organizations are now relying on telecommuting more than ever. While it has its short-term benefits, business leaders must also leverage the technology in a way that will lead to new opportunities and advancements down the line. In the world of cybersecurity, telecommuting is not considered to be a catalyst for revolutionary change in how organizations architect the security of their networks. Instead, it is seen as a catalyst for evolutionary change that could lead organizations and security leaders to an advanced position. In other words, the security decisions intended to support telecommuting could also help to build resiliency to defend against future cyberattacks.