What is Security Baseline?
A security baseline refers to a set of minimum security controls that an organisation should implement to safeguard its IT systems and data. It’s essentially a foundation for an organisation’s overall security posture, outlining the essential configurations and practices needed to mitigate common security risks.s
Benefits_
- Standardised security posture: Security baselines ensure consistency in security configurations across devices, applications and systems within an organisation. This reduces the risk of security gaps and vulnerabilities.
- Improved threat protection: By implementing the recommended controls in the baseline, organisations can significantly reduce their exposure to common cyber threats like malware, phishing attacks and unauthorised access attempts.
- Enhanced compliance: Security baselines can help organisations meet industry regulations and compliance standards that often mandate specific security controls.
Use cases_
- Windows 10/11 Security Baseline: Microsoft provides pre-configured security baselines for Windows 10 and 11 that offer a starting point for securing these operating systems. These baselines cover security settings related to user accounts, applications, network security, and more.
- Cloud Security Baseline: Organisations using cloud platforms like Microsoft Azure can leverage pre-defined security baselines to ensure their cloud deployments meet basic security requirements.
- Mobile Device Management (MDM) Baseline: Security baselines can be applied to mobile device management (MDM) policies, dictating the minimum security configurations for smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices accessing organisational data.
Key components_
- Security settings: Security baselines typically define configurations for various security settings within operating systems, applications and network devices. This might include password complexity requirements, firewall settings, application control policies and more.
- Vulnerability management: Security baselines often include recommendations for keeping software applications and firmware updated to address known vulnerabilities.
- Access controls: Baselines may outline best practices for user access controls, such as least privilege and multi-factor authentication (MFA), to restrict access to sensitive data and systems.
- Monitoring and logging: Security baselines can emphasise the importance of security monitoring and logging to detect suspicious activity and potential security incidents.
Microsoft offers various resources and tools to help organisations establish and implement security baselines:
- Microsoft Security Compliance Manager: This free service helps organisations assess their security posture against industry standards and recommended security baselines.
- Microsoft Security Documentation: Microsoft provides extensive documentation on security baselines for various Microsoft products and services, including Windows, Azure and Microsoft 365.
- Microsoft Endpoint Manager: This unified endpoint management platform allows organisations to configure and enforce security baselines across devices managed by the platform.
