In a previous blog article, we familiarized ourselves with Microsoft Defender – Microsoft’s comprehensive security solution aimed at offering a defense system to protect devices, data and identities from various kinds of cyber threats.
In this article, we look at how the cloud collaboration governance solution Rencore Governance addresses the issues of security.
How is Microsoft Defender different from Rencore Governance
Rencore Governance and Microsoft Defender protect Microsoft 365 environments but have different strengths and weaknesses.
Microsoft Defender is a security platform with various features to protect Microsoft 365 environments from threats. It includes features such as anti-malware, anti-phishing, and data loss prevention. Microsoft Defender also has several components that help organizations manage their security posture, such as vulnerability scanning and configuration management.
Rencore Governance is a cloud collaboration governance tool, while Microsoft Defender is a security platform. It is better suited for organizations that must manage their Microsoft 365 environments compliantly. In comparison, Microsoft Defender is better suited for organizations that must protect their Microsoft 365 environments from threats.
Rencore Governance provides a centralized view of all data and activity, while Microsoft Defender delivers a more granular view of security threats. Microsoft Defender is better suited for organizations that must identify and respond to security threats. Rencore Governance is better suited for organizations that must understand how their users use Microsoft 365.
Incidents
Rencore Governance includes several features that help organizations automate their governance processes, while Microsoft Defender does not. Rencore Governance is better suited for organizations that must efficiently manage their Microsoft 365 environments.
Rencore Governance is primarily not a security tool but a solution designed to help manage and optimize the governance of Microsoft 365 environments within an organization. It does this by using automation, monitoring, enforcement, and mitigation. However, it does help with specific security use cases, for example, automating periodic access reviews to ensure appropriate external and access, while running policies that ensure prompt user offboarding.
Automated Governance Tasks
Rencore Governance automates repetitive and manual governance tasks to improve efficiency, reduce human error, and save time. It includes tasks like user permissions management, site lifecycle management, and more.
Monitoring and Reporting
Rencore Governance monitors usage, changes, and configurations in your Microsoft 365 and SharePoint environments. It provides detailed reports and insights that help you understand your environment, identify potential issues, and make informed decisions.
Policy enforcement
It helps enforce governance policies across your Microsoft 365 and SharePoint environments. It ensures that all users and systems comply with your organization’s established rules and guidelines. This feature is crucial for maintaining security, data integrity, and optimal usage of the platforms.
Risk Identification and Mitigation
By providing visibility into your Microsoft 365 and SharePoint environments, Rencore Governance helps identify potential risks, such as unauthorized access or non-compliant configurations and provides recommendations to mitigate these risks.
Customization
Rencore Governance allows customizing governance rules and policies to fit your organization’s needs and requirements.
How does Rencore Governance compliment Microsoft Defender?
Microsoft Defender is a suite of products, each requiring specific configuration, management, and monitoring. It is accessible via the Microsoft Defender portal with links to other sub-sections for managing the various supporting components. If you use Microsoft Defender capabilities, you have all the tooling required to ensure your security posture is where it should be.
Rencore Governance compliments Microsoft Defender in several ways:
- Rencore Governance provides a centralized view of all data and activity, which can help organizations identify and respond to security threats and non-compliance more quickly.
- Rencore Governance includes many features that help organizations automate their governance processes, freeing IT staff to focus on more strategic tasks.
- Rencore Governance, among many collaboration governance use-cases, can also help organizations improve their compliance posture, reducing their risk of being fined or penalized by regulators.
Rencore Governance helps organizations get more value out of Microsoft Defender by providing a more comprehensive view of their security posture, automating their governance processes, and improving their compliance posture. For example:
Rencore Governance can help organizations identify and respond to security threats more quickly. It monitors all user activity in Microsoft 365, including email, documents, and files. Rencore Governance can identify suspicious activity, such as users accessing sensitive data or downloading malicious files. It then notifies IT staff of this suspicious activity so that they can investigate and act.
Rencore Governance can help organizations automate their governance processes. It provides many features that make it easy for organizations to set policies, enforce them across all users and devices, and automatically report compliance violations. Rencore Governance can also automatically remediate compliance violations, saving organizations time and money.
Rencore Governance can help organizations improve their compliance posture. It does this by providing several features that help organizations to meet the requirements of industry regulations, such as HIPAA and GDPR. Rencore Governance can also help organizations meet the needs of their organization’s policies and procedures. It also allows organizations to reduce their risk of non-compliance, saving them time and money.
Conclusion
It is worth noting that Rencore Governance and Microsoft Defender share several similarities in terms of their objectives and feature sets. Specifically, Rencore Governance is designed to provide a critical layer of protection to Microsoft Defender by ensuring that the underlying Microsoft 365 environments are properly configured and secured.
With its extensive cloud collaboration governance features, Rencore Governance empowers users to use the breadth of M365 technologies to collaborate in a controlled way. This reduces shadow IT, keeps users compliant and reduces the risk and opportunities for bad actors to act. Meanwhile, Microsoft Defender itself is primarily focused on providing a foundational level of protection to these systems, by detecting and blocking common types of malware and other security threats that might target them. Together, these two tools offer a powerful and comprehensive approach to securing modern IT environments and can help organizations of all sizes to stay safe and secure in today’s fast-paced digital world.
