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Everything You Need to Know About IT Asset Management (ITAM)

By September 16, 2020No Comments6 min read
IT Asset Management (ITAM)

The IT assets come in every size and shape. You will have obvious things in your in-house data center like routers, hardware, and computer. However, you will also have access to software assets. Most businesses can’t operate without these IT assets. They need to access their computer systems and server. Most companies don’t know about what IT assets they have. Thus, they can’t manage their IT assets. In this article, we are going to talk about IT Asset Management.

What is ITAM?

The definition of IT asset management can vary. Some people will say that ITAM will help you in getting the most out of your business assets. They are technically correct. Some IT managers will say that ITAM is all about inventorying all of your IT assets. However, this is only a partial or incomplete answer.

ITAM will help you in tracking all the IT assets that are in your network. You should ensure that all your assets are up-to-date. It is important to download all the software or security patches. You should ensure that all your IT assets are protected. Also, you need to properly configure all your IT assets. This is going to be an ongoing process. You need to regularly monitor your IT assets lifecycle. It is important to remove your old hardware and install new equipment.

In simple words, you need to do a lot of work for managing your assets. Thus, most companies ignore this process. However, there are many benefits of ITAM.

Benefits of ITAM:

There are various benefits of using IT asset management software. It can help you in avoiding potential pitfalls. Some of the benefits of IT asset management software are:

  1. You can avoid cybersecurity vulnerabilities

If you are not properly managing your IT assets, then they will become cybersecurity vulnerabilities. You need to track your software and hardware assets that are on your network. If you are not tracking your software and hardware assets, then they will become weak points in your network. This actually led to the JP Morgan data breach. The security team of JP Morgan forgot to upgrade one of their servers. This actually led to a data breach. This actually led to a data breach. The attackers actually used this server as an entry point. They used this server to steal more than 83 million customer records. JP Morgan could have easily avoided this data breach by upgrading their systems. Thus, ITAM is very important for your business. It can help you in avoiding data breaches.

  1. Obsolete assets can affect your workflow

If your employees don’t know about the assets that are available for them, then it will impact their workflow. Obsolete equipment can actually slow down your business apps. It can affect your organization’s productivity and efficiency. These obsolete devices can also affect the user experience of your employees. You should track your IT assets lifecycles. Make sure that you are upgrading or replacing your IT assets after their lifecycle. This will help you in increasing your business productivity.

  1. Not knowing about Single points of failure

Redundancy can help you in creating a reliable and stable network. This will ensure that both your customers and employees can easily access the IT resources that they need. You should work on creating an accurate map of your entire network Infrastructure. This step is going to be a part of the ITAM process. You need to create a map of your entire network. This map will actually help you in finding single points of failure in your network. You can fix these single points of failure before your network goes down. Thus, you can ensure business continuity by fixing all the single points of failure. These points of failure can actually break down your entire network. Hence, make sure that you are fixing these points of failure.

  1. ITAM can help you in staying compliant

Companies need to follow various industry regulations. It is very difficult to follow these industry regulations without using ITAM. For example, GDPR ensures that your customers can delete their data. Thus, you should have an entire map of your network. If you don’t know where you are storing your user information, then how will you delete their data? You might leave their data in some random workstation or in a backup. Thus, you might need to deal with unnecessary fines and penalties. ITAM will ensure that you are compliant. It will also help you in avoiding unnecessary penalties.

  1. You need to properly track incoming IT assets

Businesses are slowly replacing their old hardware with new hardware. The obsolete hardware is slowly reaching the end of their lifecycles. Thus, you need to replace them with new equipment. You need to keep track of these new IT assets. If you are not keeping track of new IT assets, then your network architecture map will become inaccurate. You will waste a lot of time fixing your network map. This can also create gaps in your cybersecurity policies. ITAM will help you in keeping track of new IT assets.

  1. You need to properly dispose of outgoing IT assets

If you are managing your customer’s financial data, then you need to worry about IT asset disposition. It is a major concern for companies that need to follow the PCI DSS standard. If you have stored sensitive data in your hardware, then you need to properly cleanse that drive. Make sure that you have removed all the traces of data. You need to destroy your drive. This will ensure that attackers can’t recover data from your old IT assets. Most ITAM software already comes with this feature. They will help you in destroying the data stored in your drives. This will ensure that attackers can’t recover sensitive information from these drives.

Conclusion

ITAM is very important for your business. However, you also need to regularly conduct an IT asset audit. IT asset audits will help you in IT asset management. This will ensure that your network is protected from attackers. Experienced MSPs like Bleuwire can help you in assessing your IT network. They will also help you in implementing the best security controls. Thus, they can help you in protecting your network from attackers. If you need more information regarding ITAM, then you can contact Bleuwire.

Contact us today to learn about Bleuwire™  services and solutions in how we can help your business.