Network Security Tip of the Week [2]

This week’s network security tip focuses on managing the security policy over the long haul and the concept of rule recertification as a necessary step within the firewall change management process. It’s one thing to create a rule, but is it something you want in place forever or for a certain period of time?

Rule recertification provides the checks and balances to ensure that a rule no longer needed is removed, which can help reduce policy bloat, improve compliance and minimize risk. An example of this would be during the decommissioning of a business application where rules no longer in use by any application can be removed. Here’s what Gionata, a manager from Italy recommends….

“Manage the lifecycle of the policy by enforcing an expiration date. Normally when we set up a new service, it requires new rules on the firewall, but when the service is modified or terminated no one asks for the removal of the associated rules. By requiring the duration of the rule, we can reach out to the requestor close to the deadline and ask if we need to extend the lifetime of the rule or cancel it.”

I hope you enjoy these and if you have your own tip to share, please either comment on this blog or Direct Message us the tip on Twitter via @AlgoSec.