The Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) is our country’s first line of defence against cybercrime.
The agency developed its Essential Eight for businesses and government, using knowledge gained while carrying out vital work protecting our government.
The Essential Eight help organisations and government agencies build sound cyber resilience.
It is a list of strategies you can use as a solid base from which to protect your business against cyber-attacks.
No single risk mitigation strategy is guaranteed to prevent a cyber-security breach, so we recommend that you implement the eight essential strategies to make it harder for adversaries to compromise your systems.
The Essential Eight address two main areas of concern:
- Preventing malware delivery and execution, and
- Limiting the extent of cyber-security incidents.
Each of these areas needs to be covered by four points on the Essential Eight list.
For maximum protection, the Essential Eight needs to be executed in a specific order. See the Essential Eight for a full list and explanations.