The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Computer Security Resource Center has a standardized guide that organizations can implement so to maintain an optimal level of safety. However, organizations can have their security policies as it is best suited to them.
Cybersecurity best practices that organizations can adopt to foster a well-informed security framework.
Establish a workable security policy
This policy should clearly state the organization’s security rules, the roles, and responsibilities, security references for employees and parties in the organization, the security projections present, and future, the structure of its security network, methods of compliance, and implementation.
Strengthen human resources
The human resource team should make it strategic that employees in the organization are aware of and comply with security policies that have been established by the organization and also collaborate with the top management to sanction violations of these rules and procedures.
Ensure strict physical security necessities
There should be strict rules guiding the physical spaces in the organization to ensure adequate protection of equipment and appliances. Restriction of unauthorized access to server rooms, network and power areas. Locking of hiding the location of control rooms, locking of doors with high-security locks, and turning off switches, routers, and cables. Surveillance cameras should be watching the environment, log books should be signed to track outsiders' visits, and protect portables and data storage devices that are kept in the organization.
Perform risk assessment
Valuate assets to ascertain the level of risk attached to them, and the impact and losses that could be incurred should there be any incidental occurrence. This understanding will help inform the areas of high and areas of low-security expenses.
Install good anti-virus software and carryout healthy device usage
Use firewalls for network monitoring, and install good anti-virus and other anti-malware programs to rid the entrant of viruses and malware into the systems. Update regularly, operating system, application, and software to the latest versions to better protect the devices and separate IoT devices from the local network.
Comprehensive backups
Perform regular data backups, and test the process of recovery and restoration of these backups. The regularity of data backups should be necessitated by the level of importance a file has. The database server should be strongly backed up as well as individual systems being used. Old files and logs which are no longer in use should be discarded in the right ways. Backed-up data should not be stored in the same location as the original data so that both will not be lost in case of an unforeseen occurrence.
Build a good incidence response system
Incidence response should be incorporated into the security team to plan for the cases of cyber attacks and the incidence response mechanisms should be properly tested to meet real cases of emergency scenarios
Strong password system
Passwords to devices should not be left at default or made public to the entire members of the organization who does not have a primary responsibility to certain devices. The password use should be strong and lengthy, up to 12 characters in a good mix of the alphabet, characters, and numbers. These passwords should be regularly changed and should not be common among other devices - systems, IoT devices, routers, etc that are used in the organization.
Educate and awareness of employees
There should be periodic training of employees in the organization on the ways to help secure the organization's assets from their own end. This constant training will expose them to new threats and techniques used by attackers to win their exploits and security practices that will, in turn, reduce human errors that lead to security breaches in an organization.
Data encryption
Encrypt all sensitive organizational data to promote data integrity, authenticity, and confidentiality by converting information into an encrypted format to make it difficult for unauthorized persons without encryption keys to access, protect it from unwanted modifications, and keeps it private.