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Zero Trust as a security strategy

Beyond the Patch

Article from ADMIN 67/2022

By Martin Loschwitz

Acceptance of zero trust models like BeyondCorp by Google or LISA by Netflix lags in Europe, where endpoint security is king. We examine why this situation must change by looking into the principles of modern zero trust concepts.

Even if you don't want to hear it, European IT is not necessarily known for being hyper-innovative – for a variety of reasons. Successful startups, for example, are far less likely to be launched in Europe than in the US, and not because no bright minds with smart ideas are on the east side of the Atlantic, but because of the structures of the industry as such. The much-quoted bon mot "we've always done things this way" contains more than a shred of truth. Anyone who has ever experienced a European IT company from the inside will know what I mean when I say that the impression is more of an archeological excavation site than a technology company.

Wrapped up in this dilemma is enterprise devotion to endpoint security in a local network, which encounters problems when administering clients outside that network and necessarily feeds the VPN revenue stream. However, rebuilding your infrastructure to implement a zero trust concept will pay off in the long run with less complexity and higher effectiveness, especially for employees outside the local network, which in today's environment, can easily be the majority of a work force.

Standards from the Last Century

One area in which this can be seen more clearly than in almost any other is security. Partners from the US or Israel who regularly work with large German corporations (my milieu) are amazed at the standards of security and compliance that are still commonplace in this country.

Stating that access to your own email on a smartphone is supposed to be linked to a mobile VPN "because of security" often leads to bewilderment among observers. Likewise, that many large European corporations still force employees to change their passwords on a regular basis raises an eyebrow among others. This confusion is understandable, because it has long been shown that users simply change their existing password by just one

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