6 Implementing good security hygiene: Microsoft Defender for Cloud and Defender CSPM

With cyberattacks increasing both in frequency and complexity (both of which are alarming trends), having good cyber hygiene has never been more important. Cyber hygiene is a set of practices aimed at ensuring the safety and security of your environment. Let’s compare cyber hygiene and oral hygiene. As any parent knows, telling your kids to brush their teeth and floss daily is essential to keeping their teeth and gums healthy. It prevents oral health problems (such as cavities and gum disease) before they even start. Similarly, patching your software against common vulnerabilities and exposures prevents security problems before they arise. Unfortunately, many of the breaches you read about in the news are the result of poor cyber hygiene that opened the door to bad actors, like the fictional bad actor Eve used throughout this book.

A large number of cybercriminals still find success with their attack campaigns due to poor cyber hygiene, such as poor access controls or using software with well-known vulnerabilities. This challenge is shared by businesses across different sectors, sizes, and industries. Therefore, having good cyber hygiene is crucial to having any kind of security posture.

6.1 Microsoft Defender for Cloud

6.2 Cloud security posture management

6.2.1 Onboarding your subscriptions to Defender for Cloud

6.2.2 Recommendations

6.2.3 Secure score

6.2.4 Free vs. paid security posture management capabilities in Microsoft Defender for Cloud

6.3 Cloud security graph

6.3.1 Attack paths

6.3.2 Cloud security explorer

6.3.3 Agentless scanning for machines

6.4 Security governance

6.4.1 Manually assigning owners and due dates

6.4.2 When should you use a grace period?

6.4.3 Programmatically assigning owners and due dates