Network Segmentation Security Best Practices: Reduce Blast Radius of an Attack

Healthcare networks need that protection now more than ever. IT departments are struggling to retain enough skilled labor, and the size and number of attacks are increasing, with tens of millions of people affected and a 94% increase in attacks from 2022 to 2021 alone. A particularly disturbing trend is the rise of ransomware, which holds a health provider hostage over access to its data. Healthcare cybersecurity is at a crux.

As a stirring example, one healthcare company recently agreed to pay $2.7 million in the aftermath of a breach that leaked massive amounts of private patient data. The ensuing spending included measures to prevent a recurrence, but it would have cost less to implement an effective security program beforehand.

Investment in network segmentation security before disaster strikes is essential—but you also need to make sure you invest in the right security. Organizations need a reliable system to manage their connected devices, like Asimily for healthcare IoT and OT devices, that transforms segmentation from a manual, fragile process into a continuous, intelligence-driven security control.

Why Network Segment?

Develop a Deep Understanding of Device Security Issues

Learning more about IoMT security lets you precisely apply network segmentation. Asimily analyzes the paths that attackers can use to reach a device, revealing less-obvious vulnerabilities and showing which ones are less of a risk than they might appear. Asimily also keeps a repository of manufacturer information on thousands of medical devices. This complements tested workarounds to give you the upper hand over connected device vulnerabilities. By combining vulnerability data, device criticality, security capabilities, and threat intelligence with continuous analysis of actual device communication patterns, Asimily identifies where segmentation will have the greatest security impact—focusing efforts on mitigating exploitable attack paths for true risk reduction.

Even before you start patching or segmenting, a risk assessment identifies connected IoT medical devices and their vulnerabilities, helping you prioritize which devices need protection most. Additionally, controlling who can access subnets alongside the detection and mitigation of threats minimizes your attack surface from the start. Asimily captures device identity, behavior, risk levels, and communication dependencies to ensure segmentation decisions reflect how your healthcare network actually operates, not assumptions about how it should work.

Maintain a Consistent Network Audit Schedule and Process

Networks are dynamic structures, constantly undergoing changes. It’s tough to keep pace with the rapid modifications to devices, software, and users on the network. By auditing regularly, you can find and fix vulnerabilities before they become serious problems. Rather than relying solely on periodic audits, modern segmentation requires continuous monitoring that automatically detects when devices are added, behaviors change, or new vulnerabilities emerge.

Sharing the audit results with team members makes it easier to deploy improvements. You can also compare results to previous audits to spot any oversights.

Work with data from Asimily to see which devices are on your network and what risks they carry. This lets you determine which threats are relevant—and pursue smart security policies like segmenting related assets in a group. Asimily’s continuous intelligence enables segmentation policies to adapt automatically as your environment evolves, ensuring protection remains effective without constant manual intervention.

Healthcare organizations should audit at least once or twice a year to protect sensitive data, identify hardware issues, and improve network security and operational efficiency. With continuous monitoring, Asimily complements periodic audits by providing real-time visibility and automated policy adjustments between formal review cycles.

Network Segmentation Security May Be the Last Resort Strategy

One of the main mistakes that people make regarding network segmentation is to see it as the first or only technique to use. However, networks can employ varying levels of segmentation security.

Since it takes time to segment a network, there’s a tradeoff in the costs (management difficulty) versus the rewards (increased security) of what you segment. Not every single device needs its own private space. The benefits of Asimily Insight include telling you which devices truly need remediation: those most critical to patient outcomes or most at risk of exploitation.

You can then use other applicable techniques like patching or exploit mitigation based on Asimily recommendations to protect against the most threatening situations, only turning to network segmentation as a last resort for specific devices. When segmentation is needed, Asimily generates least-privilege policies aligned with legitimate communication baselines, then orchestrates enforcement through your existing network security tools via APIs—automating what was previously a manual, error-prone process. This guided segmentation approach ensures policies are both operationally safe and security-effective.

Better Healthcare Cybersecurity With Asimily

Network segmentation is one of the most useful methods to ensure healthcare IT security—but far from the only solution. Separating off some parts of the network can help you reduce attacks and limit the blast radius of attacks that do occur. But in order to be truly effective, you need to use segmentation in conjunction with other mitigation strategies.

A comprehensive solution like Asimily understands that segmentation is just one tool in the toolkit, and plans mitigation accordingly. Rather than just blindly segmenting networks to such an extent that the practice becomes counterproductive, Asimily provides highly relevant information on device risks. Then you can safely and affordably segment what matters. By augmenting your existing network security tools with continuous intelligence, risk-based prioritization, and automated policy orchestration, Asimily transforms segmentation from a static, one-time project into a living security control that adapts as your healthcare environment changes. Segmentation becomes an operational capability that works today and evolves for the future.

To learn more about Asimily’s segmentation capabilities, download our Beyond Zero Trust: 8 steps to Holistic IoMT Security ebook or contact us today.