When we think about an architect in the most conventional sense of the term, we’ll be imagining the person who designs and lays out what’s to be built. Visually-engaging architecture may be quite pleasing to the eye, but if it’s not equal parts attractive and functional then it’s not going to be much good to anyone.

Now you had to know this was going to segue into cyber security at some point, and so here goes. If we switch over to network security architecture rather than the design of homes, buildings, and the like, we’re talking about entirely different architecture and what it means to be an architect.

For starters, architects that design networks for security aren’t going to receive any accolades for the aesthetically pleasing nature of their work.

However, the need for 100% functionality is every bit as front and center for network security architecture and – given how serious an issue data cyber security is nowadays and the frequency and serious of major corporate data breaches – perhaps even more so.

And then there’s the additional fact that there’s no distinction between architect and builder with networks. They’re one and the same, and of course that describes us here at SecureTab too. Our expertise with networks security architecture and threat and vulnerability management best practices isn’t something that came together overnight.

Rather, it started with introductions into the basic needs of companies to protect sensitive data from unauthorized access, and not entirely unlike what we’ll share with you here today – an overview of what makes for good network security architecture.

Morphing Cyber Data Threats = Need for Agile Response Capability

Now last time we talked about the term morphing, and how cyber attack threats will morph to take on different identities and require network security architecture builders to constantly be re-evaluating how effectiveness their countermeasures are / will be.

If the standard menu of threats and and risks for data breaches had remained unchanged in number and form then perhaps cyber security for businesses might actually have been a 1-and-done remedy and we might actually have one-size-fits-all solutions with cyber security systems for businesses in Canada.

Of course, that’s not the case and it never will be. So now that we’ve broached the topic in a sufficiently colloquial manner let’s now get down to discussing the realities of what makes for effective network security architecture to prevent data breaches and other cyber security incidents.

Cutting the Mustard

Okay, we couldn’t resist a little more of it and a perfect little idiom – one that’s used to describe whether or not a person/things has what it takes to get the job done or learn how to do it. If you can, you can ‘cut the mustard’. Now here there’s not going to be any learning as part of the evaluation – when it comes to this aspect of network security architecture, it’s going to be either works, or doesn’t work.

And as you might imagine, ‘doesn’t work’ introduces the possibility of major headaches and potential financial losses for a business. That’s something you don’t want. So what is it that we need to see with effective cyber security protocols and platforms in network architecture?

Glad you asked.

Modern Network Security Architecture Musts

Find that any of the following aspects / components of a build are missing and it’s probably not going to be cutting any mustard when it comes to preventing cyber attacks on business data:

• End-to-end coverage – Modern network security controls must be instrumented into all network segments for inspection of east/west traffic, network communications in the cloud, and network communications from remote workers to software as a service (SaaS) applications where the traffic never touches the corporate network.

• Encryption/decryption capabilities throughout – able to detect suspicious traffic without the need for decryption in all cases

• Business-centric segmentation – and basically encompassing a pair of capabilities – 1) segmenting east / west traffic between application tiers, & 2) enforcing software-defined perimeter network segmentation rules between users/devices and network-based services – the perfect ‘zero-trust’ arrangement as it’s called.

• A central control plane and distributed enforcement – pretty much an imperative, or ‘must-have’. Network security systems are instrumented to block malicious traffic and enforce policies regardless of their location or form factor.

• Comprehensive monitoring and analytics – cyber attacks on corporate data rely on network communications as part of their process, so security analysts must have access to end-to-end network traffic analysis along with basic traffic monitoring involving detection rules, heuristics, scripting languages, and machine learning. For starters

Other proven-effective approaches to ensuring you’ve got rock solid network security architecture in place include:

Segmenting the network so that operational rules are based on the needs of a part of the network. Web servers can be given less restrictive controls allowing external access, while proprietary data is oriented to be governed by more restrictive rules.

Hardening the network – this one is quite simple in its scope, which is a good thing. This part of Network security architecture best practices involves removing or disabling anything that is unnecessary to reduce the network’s attack ‘surface’ — the entirety of entry points where a hacker could gain access to begin a cyber attack on data.

Plan, Implement, Verify – Repeat – The need to prevent cyber attacks with regular security and risk analysis can’t be overstated. The architect should be seeing to it that audits to your network to design, implement and test a plan that meets network security architecture best practices are ongoing, protecting your business cyber threats and anticipating future risks as they might occur.

Have network security architecture needs or concerns, or inquiries regarding threat and vulnerability management best practices? contact us here at SecureTab and we’ll be happy to discuss them with you.