Book Image

Mastering Windows Security and Hardening

By : Mark Dunkerley, Matt Tumbarello
Book Image

Mastering Windows Security and Hardening

By: Mark Dunkerley, Matt Tumbarello

Overview of this book

Are you looking for effective ways to protect Windows-based systems from being compromised by unauthorized users? Mastering Windows Security and Hardening is a detailed guide that helps you gain expertise when implementing efficient security measures and creating robust defense solutions. We will begin with an introduction to Windows security fundamentals, baselining, and the importance of building a baseline for an organization. As you advance, you will learn how to effectively secure and harden your Windows-based system, protect identities, and even manage access. In the concluding chapters, the book will take you through testing, monitoring, and security operations. In addition to this, you’ll be equipped with the tools you need to ensure compliance and continuous monitoring through security operations. By the end of this book, you’ll have developed a full understanding of the processes and tools involved in securing and hardening your Windows environment.
Table of Contents (19 chapters)
1
Section 1: Getting Started
6
Section 2: Applying Security and Hardening
13
Section 3: Protecting, Detecting, and Responding for Windows Environments

Overview of the data center and the cloud

Over the years, we have shifted our data centers strategies quite significantly as it relates to the hardware our services run on. The OS types, versions, and virtualization of those services have recently shifted to fully cloud-based technologies. A traditional enterprise data center typically consisted of mainframes to store and access information. Data centers during these times were located on location or at a separate facility under management of the organization. As technology evolved, there was a shift from mainframe to server-based data centers. This is where the Windows Server family became widely adopted and grew in popularity.

Moving beyond standard hardware-based server models comes virtualization. The ability to run many servers on only a few physical servers changed the dynamics of the data center significantly. Today, we are in a major shift to cloud computing. Organizations are slowly moving away from the traditional on...