Prevention is at all times higher than remedy. In cybersecurity, it’s additionally often cheaper and fewer prone to expose the group to reputational, monetary, and compliance threat. That’s why prevention-first safety is a finest apply for delivering cyber-hygiene throughout enterprise endpoints. The problem is that endpoint safety and administration groups usually work in silos, utilizing separate level merchandise. The result’s additional value, complexity, and safety threat.

Nevertheless, by consolidating onto a converged endpoint administration (XEM) platform, these groups can lastly serve the larger good — decreasing threat and licensing prices, growing productiveness, and enhancing the end-user expertise.

Why silos are dangerous for enterprise

The endpoint is the place fashionable enterprise occurs: whether or not it’s the laptop computer of a gross sales government; the CEO’s smartphone; or the cloud servers, containers, and digital machines (VMs) that energy digital infrastructure. The problem for contemporary IT ops and safety groups is the sheer quantity of endpoints they have to handle and safe. They usually’re rising in quantity on a regular basis as organizations migrate to microservices architectures and embrace distant working. This makes visibility notably troublesome – particularly unmanaged dwelling employee gadgets, and dynamic, ephemeral cloud containers. It represents a rising headache for IT groups already stretched to the restrict by decided menace actors and rigorous compliance necessities. 

This alone can be dangerous sufficient, however these challenges are exacerbated by the way in which many IT and safety groups work at this time. Historically, endpoint administration and endpoint safety have been handled as separate features by organizations. Whereas IT administration would possibly embody deploying and updating working programs and functions and managing the software program and {hardware} lifecycle, safety groups give attention to deploying safety applied sciences, implementing coverage, menace monitoring, and incident response. In keeping with IDC analysis, 75% of organizations deal with endpoint administration and safety individually on this means. 

The end result? Over 50% of those organizations use a number of discrete options to assist their particular person siloed features, quite than on the lookout for platforms that may remedy IT challenges for each. Actually, there are quite a few areas of overlap between IT administration and safety. Coverage enforcement is required for each OS configuration and safety controls. Putting in endpoint safety instruments could possibly be classed as an IT operations job. And vulnerability administration and compliance could possibly be the work of each features. 

Creating enterprise threat

The issue with this strategy is that it could actually add pointless additional threat and complexity, if siloed instruments create visibility and management gaps, and remoted groups make uncoordinated choices. This may additionally sap productiveness and add operational value, particularly if groups are duplicating actions. Actually, extra advanced environments are often costlier to run, particularly if it means supporting a number of software program licenses and instruments when fewer would do. Use of a number of instruments also can degrade the consumer expertise if it forces IT ops/safety workforce members to swivel chairs between completely different portals. 

This disjointed strategy is already having a notable influence on organizations. In keeping with a 2022 Tanium research, most organizations don’t consider their current safety posture can cease nearly all of endpoint assaults. It additionally takes 1 / 4 (25%) of organizations between per week and a month to roll out a important patch: too lengthy when seconds and minutes rely. For some (12%) it takes over a month. 

That explains why almost two-thirds (64%) of enterprises consider it’s reasonably to extraordinarily seemingly they’ll be a cyber-attack sufferer within the coming 12 months. Critical breaches can result in misplaced productiveness, system downtime, reputational harm, info theft, and direct income influence, they admit.

How XEM can assist

Because of this many organizations are taking a look at XEM to deliver their IT ops and safety groups collectively and guarantee they’re working from a single supply of reality. IDC highlights 4 key advantages of consolidating onto a single platform:

Decreasing threat and complexity: XEM can streamline and simplify compliance duties, which regularly require a serious enter of time from each safety and IT ops groups. It additionally options instruments for fast menace detection, patching, and remediation, thus serving to to mitigate cyber threat, improve cyber-hygiene and cut back the footprint of software program operating on gadgets.

Reducing prices: XEM helps to cut back the variety of instruments that have to be maintained by IT ops and safety groups, and related prices associated to licenses and ongoing administration. By consolidating on the appropriate single-vendor platform providing a variety of IT safety and operations capabilities, organizations also can exchange whole merchandise. A excessive diploma of automation helps value discount in areas like asset administration.

Enhancing collaboration: Whereas organizations acknowledge the necessity to unify IT ops and safety groups, they will’t drive the problem. However with a single XEM platform, groups have a spot the place natural collaboration will be “found and nurtured,” in line with IDC. Working from a single supply of reality is step one on this journey.

Bettering the worker expertise: If left unchecked, dangerous worker experiences can sap productiveness and even drive expertise away from a corporation. However XEM can assist to identify efficiency points early on, stopping a flood of helpdesk tickets, and streamline the patching expertise with automation and self-service, to cut back downtime. 

These advantages are already serving to to remodel the way in which enterprises deal with endpoint administration and safety. In keeping with IDC, 50% of organizations are “very acquainted and operational” by way of deploying XEM, and almost 60% would think about shopping for such a product. That bodes effectively for the longer term. As Forrester senior analyst, Andrew Hewitt, explains, patch administration, endpoint visibility, and compliance will not be notably horny subjects in computing at this time. However they continue to be important challenges. With XEM, organizations are one step nearer to fixing them.

Find out how Tanium XEM can assist you cut back value, complexity and threat