What Is Managed Cybersecurity?

The key word here is “managed.”

Similar to how Managed Services Providers (MSPs) provide businesses with the solutions and support they need for IT, an MCSP offers solutions, services, and support specific to cybersecurity.

Cybersecurity encompasses the technology, people, process, and education an organization uses to protect its IT ecosystem from hackers and cyberattacks. With Managed Cybersecurity, an outsourced provider, like High Touch, is responsible for managing your company’s cybersecurity solution.

For small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), an MCSP can typically provide the cybersecurity functions your organization needs with a more cost-effective, secure, and dependable investment than you can produce on your own.

1. Full-Scale Managed Cybersecurity

Cybersecurity is an intricate, expensive, and constantly changing aspect of technology. New cyberthreats appear by the day, and every time there’s a new threat, there’s a new solution. Sometimes, the solution is as simple as a software update to protect against a recently uncovered flaw. Other times, it’s an entirely new solution or strategy targeting a new type of cyberattack.

Especially for SMBs, finding an affordable and effective in-house solution or expert dedicated to cybersecurity can be a challenge. A full-scale MCSP can serve as your business’s outsourced cybersecurity team, responsible for handling all your organization’s cybersecurity needs, including planning, monitoring, alerting, and remediation.

2. Supplemental Managed Cybersecurity

Your company may already have an internal IT team focused on day-to-day operations. In most cases, basic cybersecurity is part of an organization’s IT strategy.

In this case, cybersecurity is probably important to your organization but not necessarily the focus of the already overworked team—their days are already overwhelmed and challenged with requests, updates, and deployments. Many cyberattacks happen off-hours when a company is least expecting it. Is your existing IT team monitoring systems for alerts and issuing responses around the clock?

An MCSP can provide the supplemental assistance your business needs, so your existing IT team can continue focusing on supporting your business’s day-to-day IT needs.

3. Cybersecurity Consulting

Many businesses don’t know where to start with cybersecurity, and that’s OK. You might be relying on existing out-of-box solutions, or if you’re like many other organizations, you’ve been hacked, and you’re looking for a solution so that it doesn’t happen again.

An MCSP can provide assessments to help you understand your existing vulnerabilities and help develop a strategy to help meet your business’s cybersecurity needs.

Cybersecurity is more than just keeping your business safe—it’s protecting your people, including customers and employees, and their data. With a managed cybersecurity solution, you can ensure you have the most cost-effective cybersecurity solution to meet your business’s needs.

A More Secure Business

If you work with an MCSP, you can rest easy knowing you’re getting the most secure cybersecurity solution for your money — it’s a hands-off way to secure your business. Likewise, with outsourced monitoring, alerting, and remediation, there’s less stress in handling cyberthreats and cyberattacks on your own.

An Efficient, Dependable Solution

Cyberattacks are expensive and can ruin your business’s hard-earned reputation—customers don’t like doing business with companies that give away their private data. No cybersecurity solution can promise 100% security, but by working with a reputable MCSP, you can ensure your business is as protected as it can be.

Improved Cybersecurity Knowledge and Resource

Partnering with an MCSP gives you direct access to a team of cybersecurity experts. Compared to the cost of hiring an employee internally, you have an entire team of cybersecurity-dedicated professionals on your side. The breadth of experience, availability of resources, industry knowledge, and capabilities are usually greater and more affordable than you can find when hiring an in-house team.

Speedier Incident Response Times

Do you know how much it costs to hire an internal 24/7 cybersecurity monitoring and incident response team? The numbers start adding up quickly when you consider salaries and time alone. In comparison, an MCSP is fully staffed to monitor your IT ecosystem around the clock.

Less Downtime

A cyberattack can knock down a business for days or weeks at a time. If your business is attacked, do you have someone you can contact immediately, or will you be scrambling to find someone who can find a solution while they’re trying to understand your system? Partnering with an MCSP ensures efficient support when a cyberattack occurs.

The services offered by individual MCSPs can vary based on company expertise. In some cases, cybersecurity may also be included, partially or wholly, as part of a managed services solution.

• Cybersecurity Solutions. The cybersecurity hardware and software you need to protect your business, including solutions like firewalls, EDR, anti-virus, and data backup. How many layers of cybersecurity do you need?
• Monitoring. Actively keeping an eye on networks and devices to detect cyberthreats.
• Alerting. A system for ringing alarms and contacting the appropriate parties when a cyberattack occurs.
• Incident Response. How an MCSP reacts to and handles an active cyberattack. Learn about the nine common types of computer viruses.
• Remediation. Data recovery and bringing systems back online following a cyberattack.
• Training. Best practices to help your organization’s employees recognize and report cyberthreats.
• Testing. IT ecosystem and penetration testing to expose access points vulnerable to cyberattacks.

As an MCSP, High Touch engineers and supports efficient cybersecurity solutions for businesses. Contact us to learn more about a managed cybersecurity solution for your business.