Information Security Controls

What are Information Security Controls?

Information security controls are measures that help reduce risk, such as breaches, data theft, and unauthorized changes to digital information. Information security controls may include hardware devices, software, policies, plans, and procedures that improve an organization’s security performance.

Mitigating Risk With Information Security Controls

Information security controls are the building blocks of cybersecurity and risk management. Designed to block threats and minimize risk, information security controls may be any policies, techniques, solutions, technologies, or actions that can protect an organization’s information from the threat of breach or compromise.

The challenge when deploying information security controls is determining which controls will be most effective at protecting the organization and its data. Security teams must have clear visibility of the assets to be protected, the threats and risks facing the organization, and how well existing cybersecurity controls have performed. Yet, with a constantly expanding attack surface that now encompasses cloud and remote environments, it’s increasingly difficult for security teams to achieve this visibility.

Bitsight for Security Performance Management delivers the clarity that security and risk leaders need to identify risk throughout the digital ecosystem and select the information security controls that will best serve to mitigate it. Bitsight also enables security leaders to continuously monitor the performance of information security controls set in place, and to identify the investments and actions that will yield the highest measurable impact over time.

Types Of Information Security Controls

Information security controls fall into three categories.

• Preventive controls are intended to help prevent cybersecurity incidents.
• Detective controls are designed to recognize attacks while they are in progress and provide alerts to security teams.
• Corrective controls come into play after a security incident and are intended to help minimize damage from an attack or to restore business systems.

There are variety of information security controls within each category. Some controls are technical – for example, deploying antivirus software, configuring firewalls, patching vulnerabilities, or requiring multi-factor authentication. Administrative controls include establishing cybersecurity policy, conducting security awareness education, or developing incident response plans. Physical controls may include things like video surveillance, locks on server cabinets, and ID cards required to gain physical access to a property.

In a successful security program, information security controls must be aligned with type and severity of risk present in the organization’s attack surface. To implement the most effective controls, security teams need insight into the areas of highest risk and how well existing controls have performed to mitigate that risk. That’s where Bitsight can help.

Bitsight For Security Performance Management

Bitsight for Security Performance Management provides security and risk leaders with tools to continuously monitor, measure, and communicate the efficacy of the information security controls they have chosen to secure valuable assets from risk in their digital ecosystem.

Using Bitsight Security Ratings, security professionals can efficiently allocate their limited resources to build out and support the most effective controls and protect the most critical areas from cyber risk. Bitsight combines broad measurement, continuous monitoring, and detailed planning and forecasting to better assess and manage the performance of cybersecurity programs and information security controls.

Bitsight for Security Performance Management comprises a suite of solutions that include:

• Attack Surface Analytics that deliver greater visibility to assess risk exposure throughout a digital ecosystem.
• Executive Reporting that helps security leaders effectively communicate key metrics and answers critical cybersecurity questions for senior leadership and board members.
• Benchmarking capabilities that establish baseline metrics, measure performance against industry peers, and enables actionable cybersecurity forensics.
• Internal Assessments that reveal how an organization’s security posture is viewed by others.
• Peer Analytics that provide an in-depth analysis of how an organization’s security performance compares to a meaningful set of peers.
• Forecasting capabilities that project future security ratings based on a given course of action.
• NIST & ISO Framework Mapping that maps an organization’s results to industry-standard cybersecurity frameworks.

Benefits of Bitsight’s Suite of Solutions

With Bitsight for Security Performance Management, organizations can:

• Gain visibility into cyber risk across all digital assets on premises, in the cloud, in remote/home offices, and across geographies and subsidiaries.
• Identify gaps in information security controls and cybersecurity programs.
• Prioritize remediation efforts and security initiatives based on cybersecurity and cloud security metrics that highlight levels of risk, instead of trying to tackle every little risk at once.
• Quantify the effectiveness and impact of investments in security programs to help company decision makers make meaningful, quick decisions.
• Make informed choices surrounding the effectiveness of security controls, tools, technologies, and people.

Why Manage Security Performance With Bitsight?

An industry-leading solution

Bitsight is the world’s leading provider of cyber risk intelligence, transforming how security leaders manage and mitigate risk. Leveraging the most comprehensive external data and analytics, Bitsight empowers organizations to make confident, data-backed decisions and equips security and compliance teams from over 3,300 organizations across 70+ countries with the tools to proactively detect exposures and take immediate action to protect their enterprises and supply chains. Bitsight customers include 38% of Fortune 500 companies, 4 of the top 5 investment banks, and 180+ government agencies and quasi-governmental authorities, including U.S. and global financial regulators.

Extensive visibility

Bitsight operates one of the largest risk datasets in the world. Leveraging over 10 years of experience collecting, attributing, and assessing risk across millions of entities, we combine the power of AI with the curation of technical researchers to unlock an unparalleled view of your organization. Bitsight offers more complete visibility into important risk areas such as botnets, mobile apps, IoT systems, and more. Our cyber data collection and scanning capabilities include:

• 40 million+ monitored entities
• 540 billion+ cyber events in our data lake
• 4 billion+ routable IP addresses 
• 500 million+ domains monitored
• 400 billion+ events ingested daily
• 12+ months of historical data

Superior analytics

Bitsight offers a full analytics suite that addresses the challenges of peer comparison, digital risk exposure, and future performance.

Ratings validation

Bitsight is the only rating solution with third-party validation of correlation to breach from AIR Worldwide and IHS Markit.

Quantifiable outcomes

Bitsight drives proven ROI with significant operational efficiency and risk reduction outcomes.

Prioritization of risk vectors

Bitsight incorporates the criticality of risk vectors in to calculation of Security Ratings, highlighting risk in a more diversified way to ensure the most critical assets and vulnerabilities are ranked higher.

FAQs: What Are Information Security Controls?