The Zero Trust security model is a great way to ensure network security regardless of the business size. However, there are clear reasons that large enterprises might actually benefit more from this modern security model.
Things such as access control, varying cyber attacks, increased use of cloud applications, and of course BYOD policies make network security much more challenging for companies with a huge number of employees or maybe even several offices. Let’s get into detail and see how large enterprises need Zero Trust more than anyone else.
What is the Zero Trust security model?
Let’s start with the definition of the Zero Trust model. In essence, Zero Trust is a direct precaution against unauthorized access in private networks and a great way to ensure network security inside the actual network. Unlike previous models, Zero Trust places security and verification inside the network so that every activity is efficiently monitored.
The basic thought behind the Zero Trust model is “do not trust, always verify” as put by John Kindervag. This model puts verification in every step within the network; so even if a user is granted access to the network, they still need to verify themselves at every checkpoint so they don’t access the data they are not authorized for.
Just to simplify, Zero Trust doesn’t even trust the components and the verified users of a network. This model sees everything as potential threats and asks them to identify themselves before they take a particular action in the network. This simplifies network monitoring and improves insider security.
Why do large enterprises need Zero Trust?
As we can already say, Zero Trust is a comprehensive verification model that provides much-needed granular security and internal control on private networks. Sure, this sounds great to any size of business but large enterprises can actually benefit from the Zero Trust model the most. Let’s see why.
1-) Easier access management
When a company has maybe thousands of employees, the burden on the shoulders of the IT departments to manage access permissions and requests become even heavier. It may be easier to manage access based on IP whitelists when there is only a handful of team members, but this is definitely not the case with large enterprises.
The Zero Trust model, thankfully, automates access management based on the security policies set out by the IT department and makes access monitoring much easier for them. They can divide the network to create different components and specify different access permissions for each of them, which will reduce manual work drastically.
2-) Improved sensitive data protection
Cybersecurity compliance is a big issue for most enterprises. Most people are concerned about their information being in the hand of these enterprises, and the large companies are naturally at the frontline. Advancing their sensitive data protection policies and technologies can save a company from legal issues, plummeted brand reputation, and business loss.
Zero Trust security is the exact thing that large enterprises need to ensure sensitive data security. Using this model and its integral part, network segmentation, they can hide the sensitive data they store better. Not everyone needs access to everything, least privilege access is always better.
Especially when you think there are always new people coming in as new hires, they definitely shouldn’t access everything in your network once they are accepted into it. Zero Trust micro-segments private networks to keep confidential data as it is; safe from unauthorized access.
3-) Sharing cloud security responsibilities
Large businesses use a variety of cloud-based services and applications. Their cybersecurity systems might not be integrated into some of these applications and this would create an obvious security gap. But they still need to use these tools to continue their businesses.
Sharing these security responsibilities with their Zero Trust providers can both improve cloud security and help companies with their efforts on cybersecurity.
Most vendors are capable of ensuring cloud security and their services are usually integrated into popular cloud-based applications. Companies can easily communicate with their providers and get some of the security needs from them while they focus on the other aspects.
Summary
The Zero Trust security model can be adopted by any kind of business who have an online infrastructure. But it is clear as day that the large enterprises will benefit from it the most.
Zero Trust facilitates access management, improves sensitive data protection, and takes the weight off of companies regarding cloud security. These are all the things that will come back as profits to any large business.
