{"id":29975,"date":"2020-05-26T06:00:27","date_gmt":"2020-05-26T12:00:27","guid":{"rendered":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/?p=29975"},"modified":"2020-06-24T13:32:37","modified_gmt":"2020-06-24T19:32:37","slug":"why-your-cyber-resilience-plan-doesnt-include-windows-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/2020\/05\/26\/why-your-cyber-resilience-plan-doesnt-include-windows-7\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Your Cyber Resilience Plan Doesn\u2019t Include Windows 7"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Our 2020 Threat Report<\/strong><\/a>\nshows increasing risks for businesses and consumers still running Windows 7, which\nceased\nupdates<\/a>, support and patches earlier this year. This creates security gaps\nthat hackers are all too eager to exploit. In fact, according to the report, malware\ntargeting Windows 7 increased by 125%. And 10% of consumers and 25% of business\nPCs are still using it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Webroot Security Analyst Tyler\nMoffitt points out that a violation due to a data breach could cost a business $50\nper customer per record. \u201cFor one Excel spreadsheet with 100 lines of records,\nthat would be $50,000.\u201d Compare that with the cost of a new workstation that\ncomes pre-installed with Windows 10 at around $500, and you quickly realize the\ncost savings that comes with offloading your historic OS.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Windows 10 also has the added\nadvantage of running automatic updates, which reduces the likelihood of\nneglecting software patches and security updates. Continuing to run Windows 7\neffectively more than doubles the risk of getting malware because hackers scan\nfor old environments to find vulnerable targets. Making matters worse, malware\nwill often move laterally like a worm until it finds a Windows 7 machine to\neasily infect. And in a time when scams\nare on the rise<\/a>, this simple OS switch will ensure you\u2019re not the weakest\nlink. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While businesses are most vulnerable\nto Windows 7 exploits, consumers can hardly breathe easy. Of all the infections\ntracked in the 2020 Threat Report, the majority (62%) were on consumer devices.\nThis does, however, create an additional risk for businesses that allow workers\nto connect personal devices to the corporate network. While employees work from\nhome in greater numbers due to COVID-19, this particular security risk will remain\neven higher than pre-pandemic levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Layers are key <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As Moffitt points out, no solution\nis 100% safe, so layering\nsolutions<\/a> helps to ensure your cyber resilience is strong. But there is one\nprecaution that is particularly helpful in closing security gaps. And that\u2019s\nsecurity awareness training. \u201cNinety-five percent of all infections are the\nresult of user error,\u201d Moffitt says. \u201cThat means users clicking on something\nthey shouldn\u2019t thus infecting their computer or worse, a entire network.\u201d\nConsistent training \u2013 11 or more courses or phishing simulations over a four-\nto six-month period \u2013 can significantly reduce the rate at which users click on\nphishing simulations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, by running simulations, \u201cyou\nget to find out how good your employees are at spotting scams,\u201d Moffitt says.\n\u201cIf you keep doing them, users will get better and they will increase their\nefficacy as time goes on.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fight cyber-risks with cyber resilience<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The best way to close any gaps in\nprotection you may have is to deploy a multi-layered cyber\nresilience strategy<\/a>, also known as defense-in-depth. The first layer is\nperimeter security that leverages cloud-based threat intelligence to identify advanced,\npolymorphic attacks. But since cyber resilience is also about getting systems\nrestored after an attack, it\u2019s also important to have backups that enable you\nto roll back the clock on a malware infection. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With so many people working from\nhome amid the global coronavirus pandemic, it\u2019s increasingly critical to ensure\ncyber resilient home environments in addition to business systems. Find out\nwhat major threats should be on your radar by reading our complete 2020 Threat Report<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our 2020 Threat Report shows increasing risks for businesses and consumers still running Windows 7, which ceased updates, support and patches earlier this year. This creates security gaps that hackers are all too eager to exploit. In fact, according to the report, malware targeting Windows 7 increased by 125%. And 10% of consumers and 25% […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":29977,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3005],"tags":[25305,23437],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29975"}],"collection":[{"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29975"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29975\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30091,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29975\/revisions\/30091"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29975"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https://www.webroot.com/blog/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=29975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}