Online theft is the fastest-growing criminal act in the U.S., but only a few companies have full confidence in their security management practices. If you’re reading this article, it might be because you fall in the majority of companies unsure of how to best manage their security. A popular choice for businesses looking to solve this problem is endpoint protection software.
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This Article Covers:
- What Is Endpoint Protection?
- Endpoint Threats
- Key Components
- How Does It Work?
- Enterprise Endpoint Protection vs. Consumer Endpoint Protection
- Final Thoughts
What Is Endpoint Protection?
Endpoint protection is a type of solution businesses employ to safeguard their devices from an assortment of online and offline threats called cyber attacks. Endpoint devices include laptops, tablets, workstations, printers, smartphones, servers and other devices that can connect to the internet.
Also, the growing popularity of BYOD and IoT increases the number of endpoints in a company’s network to a large extent. These endpoint devices become difficult to monitor and act as a point of entry for malicious actors.
Endpoint Threats
Endpoint protection secures your devices from viruses and other malware, just like antivirus software would from traditional threats. These threats include:
Ransomware
Ransomware is a kind of malware that can restrict your access to files until you pay a ransom. Attackers hold data and devices hostage by encrypting the information and demand payment to restore access.
Virus
This type of malware infects existing files on your device and copies itself each time an infected program is executed. Each time the infected program is executed, so is the virus, enabling it to do damage by deleting or damaging files. Viruses can also shut down your device entirely.
Worm
Worms are like viruses that don’t need existing files or programs to multiply within your system. This makes them especially dangerous since they don’t require human intervention to execute and proliferate. Tech-savvy users might be able to avoid viruses, but it’s much harder to avoid worms.
Bot
Bots can automate a task online that a user would ordinarily perform. These tasks include clicks, gathering research, indexing and more. Bots aren’t inherently malicious but can do much damage with little effort. Attackers use bots to create a botnet, which gives them control over many users’ computers to send spam and steal information.
Trojan
This type of malware disguises itself as a legitimate program to encourage users to download and open them. After this, trojans can damage your device in numerous ways. Trojans can aid botnet attacks and create backdoors to your system to give attackers access.
Attackers can use these different types of malware alone or in combination to perform multiple attacks, bring unwanted traffic and flood users with endless pop-up advertisements. These inconveniences can severely reduce productivity in your office. Some of the worst attacks can hold your data for ransom or perhaps steal it outright.
Key Components
Typically, key components of endpoint protection systems include:
- Advanced anti-malware protection with behavioral analytics.
- Detection of zero-day attacks in real time with AI and machine learning.
- Robust web security for safe browsing.
- Sandbox inspection to hunt and prevent hostile threats from reaching corporate networks.
- Firewall integration to block malicious network attacks.
- URL filtering to prevent access to malicious links.
- Forensic services to isolate infected systems and analyze threats.
- Advanced data encryption like full disk encryption (FDE), email and endpoint encryption.
How Does It Work?
Endpoint protection uses different tactics to remove malware, along with preventing it from ever making its way onto your device in the first place.
Prevention
One of the first lines of defense against malware is web filtering abilities. System administrators can set up filters to deny employees access to websites that host threats. Admins can block torrenting sites, preventing users from downloading what they think is an album or film but is actually malicious files. Additionally, admins can block websites that use click bots to download malicious content without authorization.
Endpoint protection can also protect your social media presence. By integrating your endpoint protection software with your social media accounts, you can detect when attackers may be trying to log into your account. Some endpoint solutions also detect fake accounts meant to look like your business.
System administrators can set how aggressive they’d like their endpoint protection to be.
It also works to prevent malware attached to emails. This type of software scans emails and attachments for potentially unwanted files. Solutions can also detect phishing scams, looking out for attackers that may try and impersonate employees using similar email addresses.
Lastly, endpoint protection provides security through patch management. Patch management is a tool admins can utilize to make updating each device in the company much simpler. Many cyberattacks rely on vulnerabilities in a system for which there is already a fix. Many users don’t update their systems, leaving them defenseless.
Endpoint protection provides system admins with the tools necessary to schedule and automate the update process from a remote location. It ensures all your devices will be up-to-date without needing to administer patches to each endpoint one at a time.
Malware Removal
While endpoint protection does a great job of preventing malware from reaching your device, it wouldn’t be a complete solution without a method of removal. Endpoint protection software utilizes a database of known threats and uses it to detect when one has been downloaded. Advanced systems use historical data and machine learning to anticipate the threat of zero-day attacks. Many systems will then automatically remove the threat, typically by removing the infected files or the unexecuted malware itself. Some advanced systems can even provide an audit trail, mapping out how exactly the threat was able to invade the endpoint.
Internal Threats
We’ve talked at length about how endpoint protection works to fight off cyberattacks from outsiders, but it’s just as important to think about internal risks as well. Protection against internal threats is ultimately what separates endpoint protection software from antivirus solutions.
Antivirus is great at protecting your company from outside attacks, as well as mistakes from well-meaning employees that allow such attacks to happen. But antivirus software doesn’t do anything to protect your device from its everyday users who’d benefit from stealing your information. For disgruntled employees and those looking to make a profit, there are many good reasons to invest in a security system.
Access Levels
This is the first defense against insider attacks. Endpoint protection allows your system administrator to set different access levels to important company information based on the user’s role. It ensures that employees only see as much information as they need to perform their tasks. And in case of a data leak, access levels help you narrow down potential suspects to the group of users with access to the leaked data.
System administrators can use a designated portal to assign restrictions and permissions. Source
If someone needs temporary access to a higher level for a certain project, overrides can be implemented. However, these overrides also come with complete auditing to retrace exactly what information was accessed and by which user for extra protection. Further, system admins can set device-based access levels, ensuring only authorized devices can access your network and information.
Device Control
Along with configuring levels of access, system admins can also control which devices to use with the endpoint, including USB-connected devices, Bluetooth-connected devices and cloud storage. This prevents employees from downloading large amounts of data onto what the computer sees as trusted devices. System admins can set permissions for which devices are allowed and which aren’t. For instance, an admin might allow a USB mouse but not a smartphone connection.
Data Loss Prevention
If an employee makes it past the previous two hurdles, there are even more tools available to prevent data leaks. Data loss prevention (DLP) tools primarily use encryption to lock stolen information away from unauthorized parties. The only way to access encrypted data is with the encryption key, which only system administrators will have access to.
Encrypt media based on file extension with endpoint protection software.
Data sent by email, downloaded or transmitted another way will be useless to the attacker. Certain files can be encrypted, specific file extensions and even entire endpoint devices can be encrypted depending on the circumstance.
Enterprise Endpoint Protection (EPP) vs. Consumer Endpoint Protection (CPP)
The term “endpoint protection” is applicable to both businesses and individual consumers. However, it differs from CPP in terms of size, complexity and level of protection. While CPP signifies standard internet security packages, including anti-spam, anti-malware and a personal firewall, EPP features much more robust capabilities.
| EPP | CPP |
|---|---|
| Manages diversified endpoints in an organization. | Manages a small number of endpoints used by individuals. |
| Enterprise setups consist of a large number of endpoint devices that are difficult to access and monitor manually. EPP protects and manages these remote access devices. | Individual setups allow direct access to their endpoints, so they don’t require remote management. |
| Outdated software patches are one of the principal reasons for malware attacks. However, downloading and installing updates on each device is nearly impossible for large organizations. The endpoint solution downloads a patch and applies it centrally to all devices. | Customers can directly download and install updates from vendors on each device to keep their systems secure. |
| Employees don’t get administrative privileges in enterprises. Therefore, they need modified permissions to remove threats. | Consumers can give administrative permissions to run CPP on their systems. |
| Cybersecurity experts can use these solutions to monitor endpoint behavior and activities. | Users can only monitor and analyze their own systems. |
Final Thoughts
Endpoint protection provides excellent defense against unwanted intruders from both the internet and the office. But in order to get all the functionality your business needs, you’ll have to take great care when choosing a solution.
If endpoint protection software seems like the solution your business is looking for, make sure you check out our buyer’s guide. It contains all the information a buyer should know before beginning his or her software selection journey. Use it to help you formulate your requirements, implementation goals and questions you’ll eventually ask vendors. This way, you can rest easy knowing the perfect solution is protecting your endpoints.
Do you plan on implementing endpoint protection in the near future? Let us know by leaving a comment below!