If security can never be perfect, how should you manage against malicious
threats?

My classmate answers

1-

Clearly a major concern in IT today is not only the threat of malicious
attacks, but the growth rate and ease it can be these days for a relatively low
computer knowledgeable person to execute one. There are communities out there
strictly created to understanding viruses and other attacks and how to execute
them; some even put a package together with a client and software for people to
download and share and then attack a target. In my opinion this question isnt
just how you should manage the attack through what devices you should have in
place, but also establishing policy. A threat can come from anywhere, but
malicious attacks usually come through your network. Having a strong security
parimeter up with firewalls, and intrusion detection systems is a start. It
would also be best to utilize anti-virus software and ensure they are up to
date. Many framework packages are available from a variety of security vendors
that help you establish all possible entry points, but first you
must know where those entry points are. Your IT department needs to
know every protocol port that's open, an audit log tracking every user and so
forth. Every hardware system, database, disk storage should all be clustered
and/or have redundant drives; utilizing RAID to have fail-over, and so
forth.

Establishing a security policy in your company is the best way to
make sure your internal users are following documented and strict guidelines.
This can be as simple as establishing strong password protection practices, and
ensuring that they understand the rules against external storage devices,
copying data, or abusing their privileges & access. Policy is basically
setting laws around your users to ward off any internal attacks.

2-

Being able to manage against malicious threats will be no
easy feat, since obtaining a perfect IT system security is not achievable.  For
the organizations particular system the need have the appropriate amount of
money invested in IT security is important.  A security audit must be done to
assess the systems vulnerabilities and then the IT leaders or management can
determine which portions pose biggest threats to them and how they want to
handle it.   

Staying up to date with anti-virus and spyware software setup
within the IT infrastructure will help to manage against malicious threats. 
That may seem like an “easy” thing to do but an organization would want to make
sure they have implemented the most beneficial anti-virus and/or firewall
software to complement their systems.  The “better” the software the more it
will cost as well.  Some organizations may not need the more advanced software,
with all of the features available out there.  If the software is not managed
properly what they need or want it to do it could possibly hurt them in the long
run.

A well documented procedure must be established on how the
security department and IT infrastructure will operate in the event a security
issue or malicious threat.  The identification of the responsibilities will be
very important to make sure the appropriate teams take ownership of their
realms.  This procedure will have to be very detailed as it could have a huge
impact on the business operations if the appropriate business practices are not
put in place to ensure continuity.