The workplace is changing. With a shift in working models and changing legislation, it is easy for IT systems to slip your mind when responding to this shift. Working models are changing to embrace hybrid or remote working models. A remote working model is where an employee works at a location remote from the office, such as at home. A hybrid model is where an employee’s work location is both the office and a remote location, such as a home.
This has been backed up with updated UK legislation mandating that flexible working must be offered to all employees regardless of their time within the business or the circumstances.
You can’t use a ‘One Size Fits All’ approach to accommodate these models. This is true on both a business and individual basis, for many businesses no two employees schedule looks the same. This creates a need for businesses to have readily available systems to accommodate these requests, enabling effective provisions to accommodate remote or hybrid work environments.
Security Challenges of these new models
Accommodating hybrid or remote work models opens up many potential security challenges and risks. Ensuring an effective implementation requires security to be at the forefront of decision making. Some common security issues that are highlighted by these models include:
- Remote device management
Devices that access your company data, such as company laptops, can be difficult to manage, especially when they are not in a fixed location. Remote device management allows continued control for businesses regardless of the device’s physical location through centralised management. This technology allows for the devices to be kept up to date, application installations and be wiped remotely without user intervention.
Using remote device management software allows you to ensure that devices are compliant with your organisation must conform to via its centralised update and device management. - Data loss prevention
Data loss prevention is a set of technologies and techniques to prevent sensitive data from being accessed, shared or lost without authorisation. Data loss can be caused by an unintentional loss, such as accidental deletion, misconfigured systems or hardware failure. It could also be caused by an intentional loss from a deliberate attempt to steal or misuse data. Typically this originates from an insider threat, an employee who may try to exfiltrate data for personal gain.
To combat this, it is required to have a combination of hardware, such as RAID technologies for server devices, software, such as auditing and backup software, and policies, such as access rights, in place to identify, monitor and protect sensitive information. - Data breaches and unauthorised access
These are two closely related terms that refer to the access of sensitive or confidential information by a third party that does not have permission.
Data breaches are typically a result of a security incident that compromises the confidentiality, integrity or availability of data.
Unauthorised access is a much broader term that would encompass any instance where an individual gains access to data or systems without proper authorisation. This can occur through various means, including social engineering, misconfigurations, physical intrusions or vulnerabilities in the system. - Network security
Remote working increases network complexities for many businesses as internal resources are required to be accessed externally. This could be a server or PC that hosts core files or applications or other hardware network resources. Securing this more complex network requires additional technical controls, such as a Virtual Private Network (VPN), or Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA). When securing your network, it is important to balance security and usability to avoid user frustration as much as possible.
Process challenges
- Collaboration and communication
Collaboration is crucial for businesses to succeed. Providing effective platforms for remote communication and collaboration is critical to ensure an effective, modern workplace. Using communication software, project management software, and a digital CRM can be hugely beneficial to allow employees both in the office and out of the office to be in the loop and work seamlessly on projects together. This can be done using tools such as Microsoft Teams, Microsoft Project, and Microsoft Planner allows you to keep in touch with your team and keep track of your projects. - Time management and productivity
Ensuring that your team can work efficiently is critical. Your systems should embrace remote work and have no slowdown caused by being out of the office. This can be improved with seamless integration between applications with user experience focused design, allowing your team to focus on their tasks, not figuring out how to use the system.
How CTRL-S can help
CTRL-S help you gear up your systems to allow for seamless remote and hybrid work models. Our specialist team have proven experience in transitioning business infrastructure into intuitive, modern solutions.
We can help you integrate your Microsoft 365 subscription to all areas of your business, allowing you to maximise the features you likely already pay for. With Teams for seamless communication, Project and Planner for project planning and collaboration and SharePoint as an intranet and cloud file storage.
However, we are committed to finding the solution that works best for your business. We have an extensive range of clients using entirely cloud-based solutions and clients using VPN and ZTNA to securely access their local infrastructure. We also recognise the importance of backup and recovery solutions. We have specialist software to backup both your local and cloud (such as Microsoft 365) infrastructure is securely backed up and recoverable if needed.
It remains consistent that all our solutions are designed with security and usability at the forefront.
Get in touch to learn how we can help your business gear up for hybrid and remote models today.
