NETWORK SECURITY FOR EDUCATION PROVIDERS
CONTINUED
Reseller role Resellers have an important role to play in helping education providers to secure their networks. Mat notes that there is a “dire” need for security awareness education and support for staff and students. “Resellers need to be urging schools to assess their risks – only by understanding what types of threats affect the assets in their networks can they properly address the problem,” he says. Al adds that visibility is important. “Tools that let IT teams see what’s happening across their device estate make it far easier to catch problems early, before they become serious incidents,” he says. Training is also important. “Security training shouldn’t stop at compliance box- ticking for frontline IT support staff; they need practical understanding of what to look for and when to escalate,” Al says. “Resellers should be pushing schools to have a recovery plan in place, not just defensive tools, because no system will prevent every incident.” VimalRaj says resellers should focus on helping educational institutions build a practical, layered security strategy rather than positioning any single solution as a complete answer. “The starting point should be understanding where sensitive data resides, who can access it and which systems are most critical,” he adds. “From there, priorities should include stronger identity and access controls, timely endpoint patching, appropriate network segmentation, continuous security monitoring and tested incident response and recovery plans. “Budget and resource constraints are a reality across the education sector. Resellers can add genuine value by helping institutions prioritise their investments, simplify security management and strengthen resilience without adding unnecessary complexity to already stretched IT teams.” Danny says the conversation surrounding
process,” he says. “Supporting staff with password management, rather than expecting them to remember dozens of secure passwords, reduces the risk of credentials being compromised.” Danny Jenkins, co-founder at ThreatLocker, says that MFA and passkeys are an elemental cog in a security framework but, in isolation, they are not a comprehensive strategy. “Malicious actors, underpinned by AI malware, can access verified credentials and make authentication controls redundant,” he adds. “The incorporation of hardware verification and zero trust security principles create a multi-layered threat-management model to secure an institution’s sensitive data. “MFA and passkeys are important fundamentals education providers should enforce, but in isolation they are insufficient as attackers have learned to bypass them using realistic fake login in pages that prompt users for their multi- factor credentials. To protect users, organisations need to add hardware verification into the authentication process so that access is only being granted with valid credentials while being used on an approved device. If a user is phished for their MFA code, it’s useless to the attacker because they don’t have an approved device from which to use it.” VimalRaj Sampathkumar, regional technical head – UKI at ManageEngine, Zoho Corp, says MFA provides an important additional layer of protection against compromised credentials, while passkeys offer a more phishing-resistant approach by reducing reliance on traditional passwords. “However, authentication is only one part of the equation,” he adds. “Institutions must also ensure users have access only to the systems and information they need, and that permissions are promptly updated or removed when students and staff leave or change roles.”
Contributors
Mark Cunningham
businesstalktalk.co.uk
Al Kingsley MBE
netsupportsoftware.com
Danny Jenkins
threatlocker.com
VimalRaj Sampathkumar
manageengine.com
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