IDS and IPS essential to cybersecurity

Security teams face an increasing threat from data breaches and compliance fines while continuing to struggle with budget constraints and corporate policies. IDS / IPS technology covers specific and important jobs in a cybersecurity strategy:

Automation: IDS / IPS systems largely do not require human intervention, making them ideal candidates for use in the current security stack. IPS provides peace of mind that the network is protected from known threats with limited resource requirements

Compliance: Part of compliance generally requires that you have invested in technologies and systems to protect data. The implementation of an IDS / IPS solution checks the compliance sheet and addresses several CIS security controls. Most importantly, audit data is a valuable part of compliance investigations.

Policy enforcement: IDS / IPS is configurable to help enforce internal security policies at the network level. For example, if you only support one VPN, you can use IPS to block other VPN traffic.
While network security is essential to protect against data breaches - and IDS / IPS solutions fulfill this role perfectly - Varonis DatAlert monitors data activity in real-time and complements IDS / IPS. The solution not only includes signature-based ransomware detection but also recognizes the characteristics and behavior of an attack.

The 7 best intrusion prevention systems (IPS) by 2020

Everyone wants to keep intruders out of their home. Similarly, and for similar reasons, network administrators strive to keep intruders out of the networks they manage. One of the most important assets of many of today's organizations is their information. It is so important that many malicious people will do everything possible to steal that data. They do this using a wide range of techniques to obtain unauthorized access to networks and systems. The number of such attacks has increased exponentially and, in reaction, systems are being implemented to prevent them. These systems are called intrusion prevention systems, or IPS. Today, we take a look at the best intrusion prevention systems that could be found.

INTRUSION PREVENTION  SYSTEM - WHAT IS ALL THIS ABOUT? 

Years ago, viruses were virtually the only concerns of system administrators. Viruses reached a point where they were so common that the industry reacted by developing virus protection tools. Today, no serious user in their right mind would think of running a computer without virus protection. While we no longer hear many viruses, the new threat is intrusion or unauthorized access to your data by malicious users. Since data is often the most important asset of an organization, corporate networks have become the target of malicious hackers who will do everything possible to access the data. Just like virus protection software was the response to virus proliferation,Intrusion Prevention Systems is the answer to intruder attacks.

Intrusion prevention systems essentially do two things. First, they detect intrusion attempts and when they detect suspicious activities, they use different methods to stop or block it. There are two different ways to detect intrusion attempts:

SIGNATURE BASED DETECTION
It works by analyzing network traffic and data, looking for specific patterns associated with intrusion attempts. This is similar to traditional virus protection systems that rely on virus definitions. Signature-based intrusion detection is based on signatures or intrusion patterns, the main drawback of this detection method is that you need the appropriate signatures to load into the software. And when there is a new attack method, there is usually a delay before the attack signatures are updated. Some providers are very fast in providing updated attack signatures, while others are much slower. The frequency and speed with which signatures are updated is an important factor to consider when choosing a provider.

ANOMALY-BASED DETECTION
It offers better protection against zero-day attacks, which occur before detection signatures have the opportunity to update. The process looks for anomalies instead of trying to recognize known intrusion patterns. For example, it would be activated if someone tried to access a system with an incorrect password several times in a row, a common sign of a brute force attack. This is just an example and there are usually hundreds of different suspicious activities that can trigger these systems. Both detection methods have their advantages and disadvantages. The best tools are those that use a combination of signature and behavior analysis for the best protection.