How network visibility tools are changing the security game

The modern security environment is the most dangerous because it's more complex than it has ever been.

Digital transformation has enabled companies to achieve new competitive advantages using cloud, mobility and IoT, but because these enablers are being built on decade-old networks, this has also created new vulnerabilities.

Traditional networks simply weren't designed to support these new technologies.

Beyond security, this also impacts organisations' capacity to tap into the connectivity, scalability and performance potential of the latest and most promising technology investments.

Further complicating matters, these new devices and technologies are delivering massive volumes of data from the network's edge, the area most vulnerable to attacks and intrusions.

Without visibility into the behaviours occurring within a network, it's almost impossible to detect if what's happening is out of the ordinary, and therefore if breach has taken place.

Companies can't manage what they can't measure.

The sense of urgency of getting on top of this issue took a big leap forward in 2018, spurred on by new regulation like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the European Union, and the Mandatory Data Breach Notification Laws which came into effect locally in February.

Even prior to these new legal incentives, 2017 Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) study identified networking security as the number one priority in network and application performance management.

The good news is that investments in digital transformation initiatives today can address many of the vulnerabilities generated by this collision of old and new technologies.

A software-defined, cloud-centric platform allows administrators to focus policies directly at the network edge, where IoT applications reside.

By providing the visibility into every corner of the network and the flexibility to scale resources in minutes, instead of months, these cloud-based platforms offer the ability to responsively and proactively maintain optimal performance.

Taking full advantage of the arsenal of data collected can support rapid investigation and mitigation of security breaches.

By broadening visibility over their network, security managers can realise cost efficiencies, reduce risk and improve productivity – securing their reputation in the process.