How often should we apply patches and who is responsible for patch management? This article will shed more light on software patching.
Your organization may be informed of a patch by the system vendor and recommended to install immediately. However, if your system is needed throughout a year and has an SLA on its uptime, this may not be possible.
Your response is based on your organization's risk tolerance, your company’s compliance responsibilities as well as the vendor recommendations, notification of outage to your customers, availability of staff with the right skills to perform patch management, and your system’s resilience.
If your organization’s systems are strong, then testing the patch on one system first and letting it run, or better yet running in a separate development environment for a reasonable period, would be good practice.
As IT security experts, there is a need for an in-depth level of defense. Given the relative nature of scanning tools, they aren’t equipped for automated alerting of critical vulnerabilities to more than a person.
You are definitely not a stranger to those little pop-up windows. They tell you software updates are available for your laptop, tablet, computer or mobile device. You may be tempted to respond by clicking the ‘’Remind Me Later button’’. Don’t do it and don’t turn off updating your software for a long period.
Software updates and software patching are essential to your cybersecurity and digital safety. The quicker the update, the sooner you will be confident your device is safe and secure.
Why are software updates important?
Security updates and patch management have many benefits. It’s all about revisions. These may include repairing security holes that are discovered and removing computer bugs. Updates can add additional features to your devices and remove old ones. While you’re at it, it’s ideal to ensure your operating system is running on the latest version.
Hackers love security flaws which are also known as software vulnerabilities. A software vulnerability is a security weakness found in an operating system. Hackers can take advantage of the weakness by writing code to target the vulnerability. The code is packed into malware.
Sometimes an exploit can infect your computer with no action on your part other than viewing a rogue website, playing infected media or opening a compromised message.
What will happen next? The malware can steal data that are saved on your device or allow cyber attackers to gain control over your computer and confidential data. Most times, software updates include software patches. They cover the security holes to keep hackers away and ensure effective security patches.
You may have lots of documents and confidential information on your devices. Your identifiable information from emails and bank account information is valuable to cybercriminals.
Your confidential information can be used to commit crimes in your name or sell it on the dark web. If it’s a ransomware attack, they may encrypt your data. Updating your software and operating systems helps keep hackers out.
Although cybersecurity is mostly about you, there are other people that you need to think about. If your device gets a virus, you may pass it on to your family, friends and business associates. This is the reason why you need to keep your software and operating systems updated.
A reliable and effective security program like Norton 360 can assist in keeping your devices secure. And that can help everyone that interacts with you online. However, it’s essential to know anti-virus protection is not enough to protect your devices against all cyber threats.
There is also a need for security experts to always patch the software of their organization on a regular basis. If you need a cybersecurity tool that can create a strong troubleshooting background, with a focus on ransomware countermeasures, choose Vicarius.
Vicarius is a vulnerability management software that targets cybersecurity officers as well as IT managers and operators from the U.S. market.
Photo by Luis Villasmil on Unsplash
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