Protecting Your Business Against Supply Chain Attacks
A supply chain attack is a cyberattack that targets a trusted third-party vendor who offers services or software vital to the supply chain. These vulnerabilities are usually linked to vendors with poor security postures.
Because vendors have a vast user network, a single comprised vendor often results in multiple businesses suffering a data breach. This is what makes a supply chain attack occur. Instead of laboriously breaching each target individually, multiple targets can be comprised from just a single vendor.
How to prevent supply chain attacks.
There are a few strategies we, at IP Partners, recommend to protect your business from supply chain attacks.
- Educate Staff
Staff are the primary gateway to malicious code injections because they’re usually tricked into permitting cybercriminals access into an ecosystem.
Commonly, staff receive emails that seem like they are from trustworthy colleagues, however upon interacting with them, it can be discovered that they are scams or phishing attacks. This can lead to malicious codes being activated and internal login details being stolen. To prevent this from happening, all staff need to be educated about common cyberattack methods so that they can identify and report breach attempts.
2. Implement a Zero Trust Architecture
A Zero trust Architecture assumes all network activity is malicious by default. Only after each connection request passes a strict list of policies is it permitted to access intellectual property. This solution can secure remote endpoints, allowing businesses to feel more secure within their environment.
3. Minimise access to sensitive data
It is important to identify all the sensitive data access points as this will help note all of the employees and vendors that are currently accessing sensitive resources. Vendor access should be especially scrutinised given their risk of being the first targets in a supply chain attack.
4. Send regular third-party risk assessments
Third-party risk assessments help disclose each vendor’s security posture and any concerning vulnerabilities that need remediating. It is recommended that third-party risk management assessments should be used in harmony with a vendor security rating system. This is so that all cyber risk assessment responses can be verified.
At IP Partners, we believe these 4 strategies are the most efficient and safest methods to protect your business from supply chain attacks.
For more information on how to protect your business from cyber attacks, contact IP Partners on 08 7200 6080.
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