News
New Study from AlgoSec Reveals the Current State of Microsegmentation within Enterprises
June 2022 by AlgoSec
AlgoSec has released the findings of a new survey, conducted with market research firm Omdia, that sought to uncover the current state of microsegmentation within enterprises.
Following the rapid global shift to the cloud, all respondents confirmed that they are considering deploying microsegmentation in the near-future but admit there are challenges in doing so, such as avoiding business disruption and vendor lock-in.
The survey focused on enterprise organizations that have annual revenue in excess of $1bn. Key findings include:
• All respondents identified network segmentation, and microsegmentation in particular, as a new and immediate change needed to protect the digital enterprise.
• The top driver for microsegmentation is ensuring that services are not hurt by cyberattacks, with ransomware being the number one concern.
• Application-based segmentation is the leading approach to segmentation.
The concept of microsegmentation has gained traction in recent years among security experts, driven by the growing use of cloud technologies that are inherently complex to manage and secure. By setting up guardrails around workloads and data stores, microsegmentation offers a proactive approach to cloud security, as limiting user access results in an organization’s attack surface being reduced.
While it’s true that survey respondents understand the benefits of microsegmentation, the results show that it’s not without its challenges. These include:
• Disruption to business activity because of the sheer scale of the operation, which was noted as a top concern by 22% of respondents.
• The second most significant challenge was avoiding vendor lock-in, which 18% of respondents put as their primary concern.
• 13% reported lack of senior management support while 12% stated staff resistance to change.
Jade Kahn, Chief Marketing Officer at AlgoSec commented: “It’s clear from this study that CIOs are increasingly realizing the benefits of microsegmentation but unfortunately there are still some things holding back its wider implementation. Microsegmentation can often require highly skilled people, and the volume and management of policies requires tools that can deal with orchestrating governance. What enterprises need from any microsegmentation solution provider, therefore, is a simple approach to policy management and orchestration, combined with the support and expertise of its team. Then, businesses can reap the benefits and feel safer against possible hackers and potential data breaches.”
