First off, what is an insider threat? An insider threat is an individual inside an organization discovered to have been accessing records without authorization. Companies must take steps to reduce the potential for insider threats, which is their top source of security incidents.
#1 Educate - The workforce (meaning all employees) must be educated on allowable uses and disclosures of protected information and the risk associated with certain behaviors, information privacy, and data security.
#2 Deter - Policies must be developed to reduce risk and those policies must be strictly enforced. The repercussions of legal violations and privacy breaches should be clearly explained to employees. They can be penalized huge amounts of money and violations can also carry criminal charges that can result in jail time.
#3 Detect - Organizations should implement technology to identify breaches rapidly and user-access logs should be checked regularly. Organizations need to have a strong audit process and ensure that they are regularly monitoring and updating access controls so only authorized personnel are looking at sensitive data, and that attempts by unauthorized personnel don’t go unpunished.
#4 Investigate - When potential privacy and security breaches are detected, they must be investigated promptly to limit the damages. When the cause of the breach is identified, steps should be taken to prevent recurrence.
#5 Train - Employees must undergo regular comprehensive training so employers can eliminate insider threats. From a privacy standpoint, training and education often start with the employees themselves; they learn all about data privacy right off the bat, from the first day of orientation. Still, organizations must remain vigilant and ensure that they are properly prioritizing privacy and security as cybersecurity threats continue to evolve. Organizations’ IT departments should send out different tips covering a variety of topics regularly throughout the year. And to keep these tips top-of-mind among employees, IT departments should send them via a variety of media, including emails, printed newsletters, and even memos.
Is your organization's data secure? What other steps can you take to ensure protection for your organization from insider threats? Call today for a quick chat with one of our experts for more information.