Achieving zero-trust goals takes time, but a rapid maturity assessment is fast and comprehensive. In fact, 93 percent of organizations adopting zero trust found the benefits matched or exceeded their expectations, according to CDW. Since maturity assessments identify security gaps and make actionable recommendations on how to close them, a rapid assessment empowers school districts to bolster their cybersecurity in key areas to avoid more data losses and lower cyber risks overall.
RELATED: Get started with a rapid maturity assessment.
What Does a Rapid Maturity Assessment Entail?
Zero trust is an incremental process, and as schools begin their journeys, expert assessments can be an extremely useful tool to evaluate security issues and work toward solutions. CDW’s rapid zero-trust maturity assessment measures an organization’s IT environment against CISA’s Zero Trust Maturity Model.
This model includes five core pillars:
- IDENTITY, including multifactor authentication, identity lifecycle management, visibility into user behavior analytics, identity and credential administration, and risk assessment
- DEVICE, including configuration management, real-time threat analysis, asset tracking and patching
- NETWORK/ENVIRONMENT, including macrosegmentation and microsegmentation, protocol encryption, machine learning–based threat protection, and Infrastructure as Code automation
- APPLICATION WORKLOAD, such as continuous access authorization, application security testing, and dynamic application health and security monitoring
- DATA, including classification, least-privilege access controls, end-to-end encryption, access logging, and immutable data backup and restore
The assessment also offers a four-week workshop with CDW experts to help teams design their zero-trust strategy and prioritize cybersecurity projects. The workshop includes direction on how to start tackling issues using the IT resources on hand so that schools can make immediate progress toward their zero-trust goals.
DISCOVER MORE: Protect your schools from cybercrime with a zero-trust approach.
How Does a Rapid Maturity Assessment Facilitate Zero Trust?
As noted in Verizon’s 2023 Data Breach Investigations Report, 3 in 4 breaches involve human error. This is part of why zero trust — which requires users and devices to prove their identities before accessing a network — is so essential.
These assessments can also catch vulnerabilities that IT leaders may miss. According to CoSN’s report, “EdTech Leaders tend to underestimate the threats to their network: 50 percent or more rated five threat types as relatively low.” This is further corroborated by research from PwC, which states that “more than 40 percent of leaders said they do not understand the cyber risks posed by emerging technologies, like virtual environment tools, generative AI, enterprise blockchain, quantum computing and virtual reality/augmented reality.”
This, and the fact that many schools are early in their zero-trust journey, makes rapid maturity assessments incredibly useful. A maturity assessment framework can demystify the complexity of zero trust and enable organizations to evaluate their zero-trust maturity, from identity to endpoint, network and infrastructure.
