Nov 10, 2020

Keeping Your Devices Secure

By Taylor Matthews

Category: Products/Support

Last updated Nov 10, 2022

In 2019, the number of IoT cyber-attacks increased by more than 300% and that number only continues to rise year after year as more things are moved to the internet. (Forbes, 2019).

If you aren’t focusing on security of your devices or equipment now, you will eventually be affected. It’s important that we secure all aspects of our devices and connections to limit our risk and keep our services, businesses, and applications running as much as possible.

In today’s post, we’ll talk about public vs. private networks, as well as other tips to keep your devices secure.

Public vs. Private Networks

The main difference between the two is the number of people on these types of networks. A public network could be accessed or attacked from anyone else that is on that network. A private network, however, is a trusted network of users or devices. The only way to access a private network is with a secure and private virtual network connection, which significantly reduces your risk of a cyber-attack.

A device that is on a private network will see significantly less threat from malicious actors. All of the users and devices on the OptConnect private network are trusted, secured, and monitored for malicious activity. By putting your devices on a private network, you can trust that security is top of mind and that efforts are being taken to keep your business, devices, and applications safe.

Public networks are constantly under attack by malicious actors or internet scanners. If your device exists on a public network, you can know for certain that it has been scanned, analyzed, and stored on the internet for someone to see, whether you want it or not. There is nothing you can do to prevent it. This poses a very significant risk to your business.

Other Considerations

Security has to continue beyond the network layer. Just being on a private network is not enough. You should take certain steps to make sure you’re monitoring the security of your devices and applications. Security patches are a minimum requirement and should be done frequently.

One key factor in security is passwords. Password policies should exist to make sure that the last layer of defense to access your devices isn’t a weak or guessable password. Passphrases are much more secure than passwords. You’ll also want to turn off any services that aren’t being used. If you aren’t using a certain service, shut it off. Don’t leave unnecessary services available to the network. Firewalls can help limit what services you’re making available to the network.

Additionally, it’s a good idea to Invest in a vulnerability scanner and run automated scans against your equipment to know when a device becomes vulnerable. The threat landscape is always changing and knowing as much as you can about your equipment is easy with an automated scanner.

Last but not least, beware of phishing attempts. Even with the best technical security in place it is very possible to be vulnerable to social engineering attempts. If something seems off, it probably is. Seek out training on social engineering awareness to make sure you add to your security.

Security With OptConnect

Here at OptConnect, we take security very seriously from all aspects of our business. We want to make sure that our hardware, networks, applications, and team are as good as they can be. That is why our managed connectivity is the number one choice for a wide variety of devices. A managed cellular solution protects devices by providing: