• Many threats do not arrive through your network perimeter at all.
    They arrive through the endpoint itself.

    Firewalls and VPN gateways get most of the attention when you design security.
    But a single infected laptop inside your office bypasses every perimeter control you built.

    A Vast and Diverse Attack Surface

    An endpoint is any device that connects to your network.
    Every one is a potential entry point for an attacker.

    Multiple endpoint types connected to a corporate network: laptop, PC, smartphone, tablet, IP phone, IoT device

    Figure 1 – Endpoints come in many forms and all connect to your network

    A laptop, a PC, a tablet, a smartphone, an IP phone, an IoT device, all of them qualify.
    Thanks to BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policies, personal devices connect to your corporate network every day.

    These devices may carry vulnerabilities, outdated software, or already-installed malware.
    They bypass your network security entirely because they sit inside the trust zone.

    Answer the question below

    What acronym describes the policy of letting personal devices connect to the corporate network?

    The Limits of Traditional Antivirus

    For decades, antivirus software protected endpoints by maintaining a database of known malware signatures.
    When a file matched a known signature, your antivirus blocked it before execution.

    A malware file on the laptop reaches the antivirus, matches the signature database, and is blocked before reaching the endpoint

    Figure 2 – A known malware is matched in the signature database and blocked

    This model works well as long as the threat is already known.
    But attackers adapt constantly.
    When a variant gets detected, they modify its code and change its hash.
    The new version is invisible to your antivirus.

    A new malware variant on the laptop has a hash the antivirus has never seen, no signature matches, and the malware reaches the endpoint

    Figure 3 – A new variant has an unknown hash and reaches the endpoint

    A static, point-in-time detection engine cannot keep pace with this dynamic threat landscape.
    Your endpoints need continuous monitoring and cloud-backed intelligence.

    Answer the question below

    What does traditional antivirus rely on to detect malware?