The zero-trust model to business security is actually proposed by the well-known Market research company, Forrester Research, almost ten years ago, and the fact is that it is one of the most challenging approaches to implement.

Yes, it clearly means that you need precise knowledge and perception about all the changes it involves and not only that, even the impact as well that it can have on the user experience.

What is Zero-Trust?

The zero-trust model simply highlights the sturdy user authentication and validation of devices on the network and endpoint security as a key to protecting applications and data against new and emerging threats. 

Rather than having constraint mechanisms on the edge of the network, the zero-trust model simply converges on pushing them as close as possible to the real surface that needs to be protected.

Moreover, the users and devices are not trusted automatically, as they remain behind the edge of the company or in a trusted network.

Basically, when looking at cybersecurity defense models, the Zero Trust simply implies that all devices, resources, systems, data, users, and applications are not to be trusted.

Let me make this whole thing quite simple, your workforce is increasingly on the go accessing your applications on multiple devices and from many locations.

And to be competitive you simply need to ensure that all these apps work quickly and seamlessly along with the proper security framework that protects your enterprise network and data. 

Yes, basically, your enterprise infrastructure must defend against ever-evolving threats like malware and targeted breaches that can originate from anywhere and could be performed by anyone.

As if you are depending on the traditional security systems then let me clarify that traditional security systems could put your business at risk, hence, you must transform your traditional security system to protect against today’s environment.

And for this, a zero-trust security architecture is the best answer, as zero trust means to verify and never trust.

It means you only deliver apps and data to authenticated and authorized users and their devices, as here you inspect and log traffic proactively and you prevent malware and DNS-based breaches while ensuring fast and reliable apps study.

Define the Protection Surface for your Organization

Basically, the Zero Trust is the new and best model for strengthening security in the enterprise.

While in the past the companies protected themselves by building a fortress everything inside the network was considered trusted and everything outside the network was untrusted, and to do so they used firewalls and other security systems to create a security perimeter.

But, hold on, as here the most important thing that we should note, what if the security perimeter was breached? It means the attackers will gain trusted access to critical resources, where employees are working and get access to the files from their mobile devices instantly and not only that even get access to the cloud as well. 

In simple words, the network will no longer remain on your control point. Hence, today’s security perimeter has shifted to the people who are accessing your network and here the zero trust security model could only recognize the trust needs to move beyond the network perimeter.

Moreover, the zero-trust security model simply makes a simple proposition of trust, where no one verifies everyone, no matter their location or device confirming that they are the right people who have the right access.

Map Your Data flow

Now after reading and knowing about the zero trust model, you surely have understood that how important it is nowadays for big enterprises.

However, apart from its necessity, the most important thing that we should always keep in mind that while planning a zero-trust security model, we all should consider the impact of the security model of your enterprise on your user.

Yes, as we told earlier that the never trusting and always verifying motto of zero-trust security models will simply modify the users’ interaction with your systems and data.

Hence, before, implementing you should know your users, their apps that they are accessing, how they are connecting to your apps and, of course, the controls that you have for securing that access.

However, apart from all these things, the most important thing that you need to know is your users, the apps your users are accessing, how they are connecting to your apps and, of course, the major one is the controls that you have actually securing the access or not.

All these factors are really important, the user experience simply depends on these factors, hence, you should take care of all these key factors to make stable and secure your enterprise.

Create Privileges Based on Segmentation and Data behavior

First of all, to implement zero-trust, you should choose a proper threat prevention security system, and it should be based on single consolidated security architecture.

Basically, zero trusts people is about enforcing the least privileged access policy, as your zero-trust security model should create a user based rule to allows only the members of the sales organization to access the salesforce application.

Moreover, the zero-trust data is about tracking and protecting the organization’s sensitive data wherever it is; the zero-trust workloads is also about securing workloads in private, public and hybrid clouds as well.

Hence, while choosing the right security model, you should always note that your security system offers the cloud guard or not, as it creates granular segmentation between cloud objects and multi-cloud environments.

Basically, all these security rules simply limit the access of a virtual machine in AWS to an internal database server in VMware NSX. Only through a specific protocol, the zero-trust networks start segmenting your network to protect all your internal assets from the malicious threats.

While now, if we talk about the zero trust devices, then let me clarify that zero trust devices is about securing every device connected to your network, simply to identify and block unauthorized access to and from IoT devices.

This security rule limits the communication between IP cameras and the building management system.

While the visibility and analytics are the core of any zero trust implementation, moreover, decentralized security management provides you full visibility into your entire security posture to identify suspicious activity, view and analyze billions of log records and follow corporate policy and regulations like HIPAA, GDPR, PCI-DSS, and many more.

Create Zero Trust access platform Based on Data Sources

Basically, to create zero trust access platform, first of all, you have to know all the devices exist on your network, once you establish what the devices are, now simply you have to identify that how the information flows between those devices and that’s useful for a lot of different reasons.

As they are the ones that will only provide the basis for doing the segmentation that you want to do.

Nowadays most security professionals agree that the organizations must adopt zero-trust models, as there are multiple high profile data breaches are continue to be reported, oftentimes involving well-intentioned employees as well.

Generally, any security model that allows devices to connect to the network without explicit permission or allows devices to move laterally within the network without restricted access leaves an organization vulnerable, and all these are some of the common reasons for adopting a zero-trust model.

The zero trust architecture typically assumes no actors or systems are trusted by default, it employs a never trust policy and always verify strategy.

It means that everything must be verified before granting Network access, as it leverages micro-segmentation while for the granular access it grants the least privilege and continually monitors the actors and systems on the network to ensure adaptive controls.

Whenever enabling a new network security technology always understand your environment and always use a test network simply to implement a zero-trust model.

Advanced Threat Protection

Advanced threat protection which is also known as ATP, and it’s a product that we wholeheartedly recommend, as it safeguards your business from email phishing attacks and zero-day malware.

If we use a point of view it’s also a product that’s got your back at times when perhaps you’re too busy distracted or if you simply forget to go through the usual checks, as now we all use email and it is one of the most powerful forms of communication, but, hold on, it’s also one of the most creative source of attacks as well that we see today and it serves as a vehicle for attackers to target and compromise your users by stealing their credentials or weaponizing content in order to penetrate your company’s Network sometimes. 

All these attacks are obvious, as they remain undetected which allows the attacker to silently move through your network to breach data or steal intellectual property.

Hence, the advanced threat protection simply gives you built-in proactive protection that even extends to your collaboration services and email to destroy malicious content. Moreover, it also gives you the ability to review all the activities gathered in real-time and provides you with the controls to harden your environment.

Hence, we firmly believe that every company should have advanced threat protection.

Conclusion

Now after reading this whole guide, you surely have understood, what is Zero Trust, how important it is, and how you can implement it.

Hence, here in this guide, we have presented all the 5 major steps to go Zero Trust and all the possible necessary information about it.

So, what do you think about this? Is it necessary to go zero-trust? Simply share all your views and thoughts in the comment section below. And if you liked this post then simply do not forget to share this post with your friends, family and on your social profiles as well.