Organisations regularly take steps to prevent external cyber attacks, but insider threats can be just as damaging to a business’ security and reputation. So, what are insider threats and why are they bad for organisations? Essentially, insider threats are cyber-attacks which come from inside a company. 

Insider threats may involve previous or current employees, business partners, or contractors with sensitive data access. Whether the intent is careless or deliberate, an insider threat is when an individual misuses their access to expose sensitive information. No matter how large a business is, no enterprise is impervious to insider attacks. In 2022, multiple Microsoft employees revealed login information to the firm’s GitHub framework. This would have given potential attackers access to internal Microsoft systems.

In 2023, electrical vehicle enterprise Tesla also experienced a significant data breach carried out by two previous employees. The insider breach exposed production secrets, employment records, and customer bank details, seriously tarnishing the brand’s reputation. With 74% of organisations being at moderate risk of insider threats, we always advise organisations to take insider threat prevention seriously, and deploy measures to detect cyber attacks before they can inflict serious damage. 

Three Types of Insider Threats

There are three types of insider threats to be aware of:

1. Malicious Intention

Malicious insider threats are when insiders carry out deliberate action against their organisation. They may be irritated employees or people attempting to gain from selling stolen information. These individuals intentionally sidestep security to inflict malicious damage.

For instance, an employee who works at an e-commerce store might have a grudge against their boss. If this insider has access to the store’s domain, they can mess with the domain’s links, directing website visitors to untrustworthy sites. This can put customer information at risk, leading to severe consequences for the store and store owner. 

2. Negligent/Accidental Action

Insider threats are not always deliberate, but mistakes, though not intentional, can be just as damaging. Employees who don’t have cyber security awareness can pose negligent insider threats, whether that be through inexperience or carelessness.

An example of negligent action is if an employee leaves their laptop unlocked in a busy office. Anyone could access sensitive information on their computer, leaving confidential files, like password credentials or contract documents, at risk. 

3. Social Engineering

Cyber hackers can influence insiders within an organisation through social engineering. These hackers might impersonate a manager or colleague to trick someone into revealing sensitive data. 

For instance, hackers might impersonate a CEO through an email to an organisation’s accounts department, commanding an employee to send large amounts of money. The organisation may have cyber security measures in place, but if the employee believes the claim is genuine, they may still carry out the transaction, leading to serious problems. 

Why Is Insider Threat Prevention So Difficult? 

Insider threats can have serious consequences for a business’s finance, operations, and reputation. IBM’s 2023 Cost of a Data Breach Report found that data breaches caused by malicious insiders had the most financial impact. At $4.90 million, malicious insider threats were 9.5% higher compared to the average data breach cost of $4.45 million.

No business wants to lose money, but despite the danger of these attacks, many organisations struggle to implement effective insider threat prevention methods. In comparison to external cyber attacks, nine out of 10 IT professionals found it equally or more difficult to find or prevent insider cyberattacks, while 40% found detecting and preventing internal attacks harder overall. 

It’s difficult to identify insider threats as the insider in question has genuine access to their company’s information and systems. Depending on the company, employees need access to cloud applications, emails, or network assets to carry out their work. As the insider has access, an organisation’s security defences might view their actions as normal, instead of flagging their behaviour. 

Insider Threat Prevention Tactics For Businesses

Preventing insider threats can be difficult, but here are some insider threat prevention tactics organisations can use to keep their business secure. 

1. Perform Regular Security Assessments

Insider threat security assessments should highlight any weaknesses and help remove flaws in a business’ security system. A security assessment should go over the following points:

• Business cyber security policies
• Cyber security training
• Implementing password training
• Computer hardware and software 
• BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) plans

Assessing these areas should uncover any aspects that could be at risk, allowing you to amend issues before they turn into threats. For example, your organisation’s present BYOD policy may have unrestricted data download capabilities. Employees that obtain sensitive information could share the data, without being tracked. 

If a security assessment found this was a risk, you could opt to remove the BYOD policy, or place strict restrictions on downloading data. That said, don’t just carry out one assessment! Organisations should perform regular security assessments to ensure their cyber security policies are working. 

At Net Consulting, our Compliance & Vulnerability Assessment helps organisations assess their cyber-attack risk, including the danger of insider threats from employees, both past and present. We can help you identify and measure the security risks facing your business, then create an action plan to help address these issues to keep your organisation secure. 

To discuss your security needs with a team member, call us at +44 (0)29 20972020, or check out our services to find out more about what we do.

2. Employee Cyber Security Training

Your IT department might be up-to-date with cyber security, but all employees within your company should be given cyber security training. Education is a great way of preventing accidental or negligent insider threats. Employees should know how to identify scam emails, improve password hygiene, and take caution with suspicious file attachments. 

In addition to across-the-board training, you should consider smaller training sessions based on typical practices. For example, e-commerce divisions that record confidential customer details should have data privacy training, while marketing departments that send regular emails should have phishing awareness training. 

3. Acknowledge Potential Malicious Insiders

Malicious insiders who deliberately compromise data privacy or network security may be a minority, but they can be a severe enterprise security hazard. Malicious insiders can occur after several factors, but sudden job changes after termination or redundancies shouldn’t be overlooked. 

A Bloomberg 2015 survey found that employees were 69% more likely to seize corporate information before they resigned, while a Biscom survey found that 87% of employees took information they had developed, like strategy documents or corporate presentations, once they left a job. 

Companies should take steps to recognise data misuse signs to prevent malicious insiders from accessing company information when they leave. Employees should be limited in their ability to send, download, or spread confidential data. 

This includes:

• Examining and blocking email transfers indicative of data leaks. 
• Identify and block questionable email activity, like dubious data distribution
• Deny access to users during non-operating work hours, or if connections come from unknown IP addresses.
• Limit all file transfers extending to external USB devices and public cloud storage. 

Organisations should also aim to create a culture and process where team members can report abnormal or worrying behaviour. Encouraging staff to report from all departments can help avoid insider threats later down the line. 

4. Outlining Employee Exit System

In relation to the point above, having an employee exit system can help you gain employee feedback to improve your business, but it’s also useful for insider threat prevention.  

Offboarding cyber security best practices include:

• Disabling mobile application access from personal smartphones and laptops
• Deleting account access immediately after an employee leaves
• Updating shared login credentials 
• Blocking remote access
• Retrieve company-owned equipment

It’s also a good idea to remind employees of the consequences related to accessing company files, accounts, and systems after their departure. 

5. Adopt The Zero Trust Approach

The Zero Trust approach means that trust isn’t automatically given within a company, even for employees higher up within an organisation. The Zero Trust approach means that insiders always go under ongoing authentication. 

Say you have remote staff that work away from the office. If they have remote access through their own devices, you give employees access to your company’s systems. Whether it be accidentally or deliberately, employees with this access can expose important confidential data. 

A method of implementing the Zero Trust approach is with secure remote access, like Virtual Private Networks (VPNs). This adds an extra security layer to network resources, which gives remote staff controlled access to an organisation’s systems. 

Businesses can also monitor and assess users and device behaviour to identify potential threats, or implement multi-factor authentication to ensure only authorised users can access sensitive data. 

Protecting your business from insider threats is a crucial step on the road to robust enterprise security. This can be difficult, but proactive measures like employee training, behavioural monitoring, and technology solutions can help create a secure culture within your organisation. 

We hope this post helped you understand more about insider threat prevention and the three types of insider threats that can affect your organisation. 

At Net Consulting, we offer tailored cyber security consultancy services centred around the NIST’s Cyber Security Framework. 

Supported by our team of skilled professional consultants, our services help businesses prevent cyber threats and respond to them if they occur.  

To find out more about our services, give us a call at +442920972020, or send us an email at info@netconsulting.co.uk. 

You can find out more about our DEM, Secure Network Services, and IT Management services from our website.