70% Percent Of IT Administrators Feel Windows Environment At Risk Of Malicious Attacks
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
IT Administrators report heightened interest in visibility, configurations, settings, and standards.
Seven of 10 IT administrators believe their Windows environments are at risk of malicious attacks, while 10 percent admit to being unaware of the security standards for Windows environments according to a ManageEngine’s survey. The survey indexed the attitudes and common security practices of 327 IT admins that specialize in Active Directory and Windows Server.
The survey, Active Directory and Windows Server Security – Trends and Practices, also found 72 percent of IT admins seek a solution that sends alerts when security configurations change, yet 55 percent have not begun to use one and 47 percent find it difficult and time consuming to gain awareness of the current security settings of their Windows environment. The data revealed IT administrators report heightened interest in visibility, configurations, settings, and standards.
Over the past few years, the success rate of internal and external attacks on corporate networks has been growing. Since Active Directory is the most important technology to control access to the network and resources, it is important to secure all aspects of this portion of your network. However, it appeared that many organizations were not securing Active Directory correctly, so ManageEngine wanted to get answers.
The success rates of both internal and external attacks on corporate networks have been escalating at an alarming rate over the past several years. The heart of most corporate networks is the Active Directory, which is the most important technology to control access to the network and resources. The growing success rate of attacks is evidence many organizations fail to adequately secure all aspects of this portion of a network, a reality that provides great opportunities to VARs to protect their clients.
The recent ManageEngine survey was designed to better understand the common security practices followed by IT admins that specialize in Active Directory and Windows Server. The full survey and results from 327 practitioners is available here.
“Organizations clearly are paying closer attention to the security for Active Directory,” said Derek Melber, technical evangelist for ManageEngine and microsite manager of Security Hardening for Active Directory and Windows Servers. “However, the survey results also indicate that Windows environments are far from being secure, and improved overall visibility is essential.”
The study clearly demonstrates the need for organizations to take immediate action to secure their Windows environments. The findings also imply a visibility gap in the market; despite the market availability of solution providers, at least half the organizations do not use a configuration alert system and may need to perform requirement-to-solution mapping to reduce this gap. And for efficient management of their Windows environments, IT admins could benefit from exploring available reporting solutions.