If you’re looking for a complete approach to productivity and security, Microsoft 365 Business Premium is it. This top tier of the popular software stack gives businesses of all sizes access to advanced protection tools.
Tools that keep up with rapidly evolving cyber threats and help you navigate the complex compliance requirements we all face today. Tools that protect data, manage devices and give visibility into your security posture.
You may be saving a few dollars by not upgrading, but you’re opening yourself up to risks that will end up costing far, far more.
If you’re on the fence about making the upgrade to Business Premium, read on to learn about the security features your organisation will be missing.
Conditional Access: Controlling Who Gets In
According to Microsoft:
“Conditional access is an intelligent policy engine that helps organisations better control how users access corporate resources.”
This is a powerful security feature that decides who accesses your systems and under what conditions. It dynamically decides whether to allow access, block it completely or request extra verification, based on a number of real-time signals including location, type of device and other session risk information.
By requiring more than simply a username and password, conditional access stops suspicious attempts before they breach your defences and cause a lot of damage. Strengthening your entry points in this way has become a baseline expectation of businesses. It’s critical and it’s one of the reasons we recommend Business Premium to all our clients at Smile IT.
Intune MDM: Managing and Securing Devices
Remote work is part and parcel of business life now. You get team members logging into the company network from home, on-site or in the airport before catching their flight.
Each device they use is a gateway to your business data.
With Microsoft Intune Mobile Device Management you have control over these devices. You create and enforce the security policies on them, and can even erase a device remotely if it has been lost or stolen. A member of your finance team loses their phone filled with important files? With Intune, you can lock it down instantly and prevent data from leaking out.
Intune is a cloud-based endpoint management solution that simplifies app and device management. With it, you create the policies that allow access to organisational resources and you manage access to apps and their data.
Without Intune, your business data is scattered cross unmanaged devices. Think of it – your customer records, financial information or intellectual property. All at risk. With Intune, the risk is contained and the mobile endpoints are secured.
Defender EDR: Detecting and Responding to Threats
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is an EDR (Endpoint Detection and Response) system. It’s a powerful weapon in the fight against ransomware, allowing businesses to secure endpoints with industry-leading, multiplatform detection and response.
Defender looks for unusual patterns of behaviour – like if ransomware starts encrypting files or a phishing attempt slips through. When this happens, it automatically responds and contains the threat. It uses AI to amplify your security strengths, while minimising vulnerabilities by providing a clear view of your organisation’s attack surface.
Here’s what we love about it: you’re not reacting after the fact. Defender alerts you early, and provides the tools to get the job done to keep your organisation safe. It could be the difference between getting through a cyber attack or being crippled by it.
Microsoft Secure Score: Knowing Where You Stand
Microsoft Secure Score delivers a clear benchmark of your security health. It looks at your configuration, compares it to best practices, and gives your security posture a score along with recommended actions to improve.
If you don’t know what you’re doing wrong, you don’t know what to improve. Secure Score shows business owners and managers where the gaps are and guides them to improvement. Progress is tracked over time, and reporting is clear and measurable.
An added advantage of Secure Score – if you’re looking to get cyber insurance, many insurers now use it to provide posture-based rates. The better your score looks, the more favourable your rates will end up being.
Data Loss Prevention: Protecting What Matters
Businesses produce masses of data each day. It fuels decisions, drives strategy and often contains personal or sensitive information. It’s valuable and needs to be protected, which is what Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies in Business Premium help do.
With DLP you can monitor and restrict what data leaves your environment. It scans apps like Teams and Outlook, identifying sensitive information and preventing it from being sent externally. Credit card numbers, health records, or confidential documents can all be blocked.
If you’re in an industry like healthcare where any kind of data breach can lead to serious legal, financial and reputational harm, DLP could be the software that saves your business.
Contact Smile IT with your Business Premium Questions
Microsoft 365 Business Premium isn’t for show – this is serious software that lays a solid foundation for managing your It and keeping your business secure. The protections we’ve outlined above allow you to meet cyber threats head-on while ensuring you’re managing your compliance requirements and customer expectations too.
At Smile IT we want your business to make the most out of the Microsoft 365 stack. We strongly believe using Business Premium helps you do that. If you have any questions about it, or would like us to help you get your organisation set up, get in touch with our team. We’d love to review your current setup and see how Business Premium can make your organisation more efficient, secure and compliant. Chat soon.
When he’s not writing tech articles or turning IT startups into established and consistent managed service providers, Peter Drummond can be found kitesurfing on the Gold Coast or hanging out with his family!