Managing Your Data Center Security

Every year, more than $400 billion is lost around the world as a result of lapses in data center security. These breaches and various cyber crimes don’t seem to be getting any better – much the opposite, they’re getting worse.

We live in a world that’s becoming more and more connected and as a result, we’re seeing new holes in traditional perimeter security. As network infrastructure expands, we’re seeing millions of new access points for data center security breaches to slip by unnoticed. As a result, traditional methods of protecting your data just aren’t working anymore.

As the demand for data center resources increase, we’re still seeing a lag in the allocation of resources when it comes to data center security and more and more criminal hackers, “hacktivists” and simple troublemakers are taking advantage of this to stay out of sight and wreak havoc on data centers. There’s no question that this trend is growing – we see the proof in the news when organizations like Target, Sony, even government facilities make headlines.

Data centers need to continue to identify ways to identify security threats more accurately – and be proactive. Once you realize that you have to react to a data center security breach, it’s too late. As networks become more and more flooded with cloud products, CIOs and CSOs have to be aware of the data inside their network and identify and address threats that may not be coming from inside and outside of your data center security perimeter.

Map Your Network

With an accurate system map of their network, CIOs and CSOs can be proactive with any suspicious activity that gets flagged and be proactive with the placement of countermeasures that can prevent any serious breaches. Being able to see and identify these patterns will also help you bring the accountability of security to the executive team.

Identify and Control High-Value Assets

New security companies have developed data center solutions that can protect your data as the virtual, mobile and automated environments grow but the massive flow of data will prevent security experts from securing every access point and all of the data that is being stored in your servers. If you can identify the most important data to protect you can create a customized security plan to protect that data against any significant breach or lateral attack. Creating a security plan that could catch and prevent malicious attacks against credit card or health information, for example, could save a data center quite a bit of money in damage control.

Develop an Accountability Process

Every security plan that your data center puts into place should include the data center team, of course, but when executives understand traffic flow, information access and security, you can develop more proactive measures to secure those high value assets and prevent potential attackers from accessing that important data.

It’s time to reconsider data center security. It’s not simply about perimeter protection – visibility is paramount to protecting data and keeping data centers secure.