Network security refers to all the practices and software used by businesses to protect the integrity, confidentiality and accessibility of their digital assets. It ensures that your data remains protected from different security threats such as malware and data breaches.
Teams employing the right network security measures can expect uninterrupted services while preventing unauthorized access and information theft.
Given the evolving and diverse nature of cyber attacks, brands need to employ different kinds of protective measures to save themselves from such vulnerabilities.
In this article, we’ll look at five types of network security measures and understand how they can safeguard your organization’s digital infrastructure.
1. Firewalls
Firewalls are like security guards for your network traffic. They look at the incoming and outgoing traffic from your systems and monitor them based on a set of predefined rules. If a request seems to originate from an untrusted source, a firewall prevents it from going through.
They inspect each data packet that enters or exits the network by looking at its source and destination address, port, and protocol. This ensures that only legitimate requests are processed and approved.
Popular kinds of firewalls include:
- Packet-filtering firewalls: Examine the packet based on simple rules but don’t consider context.
- Stateful inspection firewalls: Track active connections and make decisions based on the health of that connection.
- Hybrid mesh firewalls: Combines multiple firewall types to secure your network. A hybrid mesh firewall is usually leveraged in complex and distributed environments.
- Proxy firewalls: Act as intermediaries between the end user and the network. It inspects the traffic at the application level.
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2. Intrusion prevention systems
An Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) constantly monitors the network traffic, identifies suspicious traffic, and takes immediate action to block or mitigate risks. Unlike intrusion detection systems (IDS), which alert admins about potential threats, IPS takes proactive action.
It uses signature-based detection to identify known attack patterns and anomaly-based detection to spot unusual or suspicious activities. Once a threat is identified, the IPS can take various actions, such as blocking traffic from the source and resetting a network connection.
IPSs are effective at preventing a wide range of threats:
- Malware: Stops the spread of malicious programs like viruses and worms.
- Denial of Service (DoS) attacks: Prevents threats that aim to overwhelm and disable network resources.
- Exploits: Blocks attempt to take advantage of existing vulnerabilities in systems and applications.
- Brute force attacks: Detects repeated failed login attempts and halts unauthorized access efforts.
3. Data loss prevention
Data Loss Prevention (DLP) prevents sensitive organizational data from being lost, leaked, or accessed by unauthorized users. Companies need it to protect confidential information, comply with regulations, avoid financial penalties, and maintain their reputation.
It secures data both in transit and at rest, ensuring the data remains secure at all times.
DLP solutions secure networks by monitoring and controlling data flow across networks, endpoints, and cloud environments. Each serves distinct purposes:
- Network DLP: Monitors data in motion across the network and prevents unauthorized sharing of sensitive information.
- Endpoint DLP: Protects data on individual devices such as laptops, workstations, and smartphones by controlling file transfers and external storage usage.
- Cloud DLP: Secures sensitive data on remote servers and cloud applications, ensuring both security and compliance.
They inspect the content and context to recognize protected data and apply pre-defined rules to stop violations.
When a breach is detected, a typical DLP system can take many actions including encrypting the data, blocking file transfer, or alerting the administrators.
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4. Network access control
The Network Access Control (NAC), as the name suggests, regulates where the data or applications can be reached. It ensures that only authorized users can access the organizational data on compliant devices.
This network security measure prevents the connection of an unapproved device to ensure the security and safety of private data.
Administrators will first need to grant access to users and authorize their devices. When the user attempts to connect with the network, the NAC will verify the credentials. If passed, the user can access the relevant data.
On the flip side, if the credentials do not match, the NAC can block, quarantine, or limit the user’s access to the data. The admins can set rules for this based on their organizational needs.
NAC solutions often use technologies like role-based access control, endpoint security assessments, and multi-factor authentication to strengthen protection. These technologies enhance security, maintain compliance, and improve productivity (via automation).
5. Network segmentation
Network segmentation is the process of breaking a network into small pieces. In the event of a breach or data corruption, each of these pieces could be isolated to contain the damage.
Moreover, this also improves the performance of each of the subnetworks, ensuring the operations continue as usual.
Security teams can create boundaries between different parts of the network to create these network segments. The three popular strategies to do that include:
- Physical segmentation: Use separate physical devices, like switches and routers, to create boundaries to separate networks.
- Logical segmentation: Create separate network segments using software called virtual LANs (VLANs). This improves efficiency and reduces cost as you can manage multiple isolated networks on a single infrastructure.
- Micro-segmentation: The separation happens at the application or workload level. It is done by isolating the traffic between individual devices or services. Specialized software-defined networking (SDN) to enforce security policies.
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Wrapping up
The state of cybersecurity in 2024 requires organizations to employ multi-layered network security measures to tackle the wide variety of digital threats.
Firewalls are the first line of defense that filters the traffic and blocks unauthorized access. IPS actively monitors the network activity during operation to detect and stop attacks. DLP monitors and prevents the unauthorized sharing of sensitive information by limiting access immediately.
NAC only ensures that authorized users from compliant devices can access organizational information. Finally, network segmentation breaks the network into smaller segments, allowing the admins to limit the spread of attacks or corrupt private data.
All the security measures work together to help businesses and enterprises protect their and their customers’ data. Organizations can leverage them to minimize vulnerabilities and safeguard their valuable information.
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