How to secure your IoT environment.

The IoT ecosystem is having a moment. This year it’s projected that over 85% of enterprises will have more smart edge and IoT devices on their networks than laptops, desktops, tablets or smartphones. Global projections for 2025 also indicate there will be over 75 billion connected smart devices.

IoT refers to the Internet of Things—a network of physical devices and other objects embedded with sensors and software. Examples include smart devices, wearable technology, sensor-assisted predictive maintenance capabilities, asset tracking systems and fleet management systems.

These devices can communicate and exchange data over the Internet with each other and centralized systems, enabling automation, monitoring and control access across various applications. They’re very handy for improving efficiency, responsiveness, convenience and decision-making. But they leave cybersecurity-minded people crawling out of their skin thinking of all the vulnerabilities they present.

By its nature, IoT is born with vulnerabilities built in.

Widely considered to be limited to smart home devices, the use of IoT is exploding in business and it’s considered one of the top security threats in business. Think of remote monitoring healthcare devices, wearable technology in tactical situations, asset tracking across the enterprise and building management systems. From there, it’s not hard to think of all the data protection challenges IoT creates.

Like all consumer-facing software and devices, IoT devices are born with risks that are acceptable for personal use, but create unacceptable risk for corporations and government entities. Here are three reasons why cybercriminals find them so attractive:

1. The diverse nature of IoT devices, from hardware to software and communications protocols, creates a lack of standardization that makes them harder to secure.
2. The devices are created with user convenience and cost-effectiveness in mind. Security is an afterthought, if considered at all.
3. Limited processing power and memory in the devices restrict the ability to implement security measures.

Each unsecured IoT device is one more potential entry point or attack vector for ransomware, denial of service, data theft and other measures bad actors can use to assail your system.

Baseline security, Zero Trust and other ways of mitigating threats from IoT.

There are multiple strategies for securing IoT devices. Most of them begin with the same tactic—baseline hardening. Baseline hardening is the process of finding and securing known vulnerabilities in your system. NIST has created standards for this process and those standards are expressed in Security Technical Implementation Guides (STIG) and Center for Internet Security (CIS) Benchmarks, two of the most widely used roadmaps for securing endpoints against known vulnerabilities. These roadmaps are updated quarterly or as new known vulnerabilities arise.

Zero Trust is another tactic whereby your system and users assume every interaction is a threat. Security moves from the perimeter to a multifactor authentication model. Because Zero Trust requires constant monitoring and authentication of users and their devices, if an adversary does penetrate the system, they won’t get very far. Zero Trust is already required for government systems, but lawmakers are keen to require it for IoT devices in the DoD. Any good risk management plan would have you build Zero Trust atop a foundation of baseline security.

Baseline hardening and Zero Trust alone cover many of the approaches recommended for securing IoT:

• Stronger authentication protocols. Multifactor authentication, biometric authentication, certificates and digital signatures can place another layer of complexity between you and bad actors. This approach is part of Zero Trust.
• Data encryption. Data transmitted by IoT devices should be encrypted to ensure that any data that is breached is difficult to decipher.
• Updates and patches. Ensuring devices are regularly updated with security patches is standard cyber hygiene. Anyone with a robust baseline hardening process will routinely implement updates and patches.
• Network segmentation. Network segmentation isolates IoT devices so, if breached, they can’t affect critical systems. This is a foundational principle of Zero Trust.
• IoT security standards. NIST and the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) provide roadmaps for securing IoT devices. With a robust baseline security program, these standards are covered.
• AI and machine learning. By analyzing device behavior patterns and identifying anomalies, these tools can be used to anticipate, detect and respond to threats in real time.
• Incident response plan. Whether for IoT or larger network security, you should always have an incident response plan. Having a plan in place can limit the damage a breach does to your technology, your data and your reputation. This is one of our Top 3 Cybersecurity Resolutions for 2025.
• Training and awareness. Human error is one of the largest causes of security breaches. Training is also a big factor in Zero Trust, so you can roll these up together. It’s the same approach: know the risks and don’t click on links or give out personal information.

Getting the most protection for the least amount of budget and effort.

It’s not hard to see the threat of IoT as a next horizon in cybersecurity. And protecting your organization and its data begins with addressing all the known vulnerabilities inherent in these devices.

With many IoT devices built on a Windows platform, the good news is that baseline security can be achieved through automation. SteelCloud’s ConfigOS is optimized to secure applications and devices that are used both on-site and remotely.

This kind of endpoint hardening can overwhelm your team with its manual effort and regular updates. ConfigOS reduces that process to little more than a push of a button, freeing your people to implement Zero Trust and other proactive measures to protect your data and systems.

If you’re curious, set aside a couple hours for a demo and see how easy it can be to lock down your technology and create a secure foundation for all other cybersecurity initiatives.