Padlock resting on a laptop keyboard

The threat is the same. The proof burden isn't.

A 40‑person city department and a 200‑person manufacturer face nearly identical attacks: credential phishing, session token theft, a contractor's unmanaged laptop, ransomware staged over a long weekend. The difference is what happens afterward. A public agency has to explain itself to auditors, to a council, and to the public — under CJIS, HIPAA, PCI, and public‑records obligations. A business has to answer a cyber‑insurance questionnaire honestly enough to keep its coverage.

Most organizations we meet already own the licensing to fix this. What they lack is the configuration, the enforcement, and the evidence. We close that gap — and we document it as we go, so the answer to "prove it" is a folder, not a scramble.

Book a security review

A layered program, not a checklist

Every control below is implemented, tested, and documented — with a named owner and a review date.

Zero Trust Architecture

Move from "inside the network is trusted" to verifying every user, device, and session. We map your current trust boundaries, then re‑architect access around identity, device health, and least privilege.

Identity & MFA

Microsoft Entra ID hardening, phishing‑resistant MFA rollout, privileged identity management for admin roles, break‑glass accounts, and shutting down the legacy authentication paths attackers still rely on.

Conditional Access

Policies that account for who the user is, what device they are on, where they are connecting from, and how sensitive the resource is — staged in report‑only mode first so nobody gets locked out on day one.

Device Compliance & Security

Intune enrollment, security baselines, disk encryption, patch and update rings, EDR deployment, and compliance policies that gate access when a machine drifts out of standard.

Data Loss Prevention

Sensitivity labeling, Microsoft Purview DLP for email and SharePoint, retention and public‑records alignment, external sharing controls, and guardrails on where regulated data is allowed to travel.

Audit Readiness & Compliance

Controls mapped to CJIS, HIPAA, CIS Controls, and NIST CSF; policy documentation; evidence packs; cyber‑insurance questionnaire support; and a remediation plan prioritized by real risk, not by finding count.

Assess, prioritize, harden, prove, monitor

Security work fails when it lands all at once. We sequence it so the highest‑risk gaps close first and users are brought along.

1
Assess

Tenant and endpoint configuration review, identity and privilege audit, external exposure check, and a gap analysis against your applicable framework.

2
Prioritize

Findings ranked by exploitability and business impact, with effort and cost attached — so leadership can fund the top of the list with confidence.

3
Harden

Staged rollout of MFA, conditional access, device compliance, and DLP, each piloted in report‑only mode with a documented rollback.

4
Prove

Policy documentation, control‑to‑framework mapping, and an evidence pack ready for auditors, insurers, and grant or funding reviews.

5
Monitor

Alerting, secure‑score tracking, quarterly access reviews, tabletop incident exercises, and a standing remediation backlog.

Analyst monitoring systems

We speak the language your auditor uses

Controls are mapped once and reported against whichever framework applies to you — so a single hardening program satisfies multiple obligations instead of duplicating effort.

CJIS Security PolicyHIPAA Security RuleCIS Controls v8NIST Cybersecurity FrameworkPCI DSSOregon public recordsCyber‑insurance questionnairesMicrosoft Secure Score

Certifications on staff include PMP, ITIL, Six Sigma Black Belt, CSM, and CEH, alongside deep Microsoft ecosystem experience.

Zero

Standing trust — every session verified on identity and device

CJIS

& HIPAA‑aligned environments for public agencies

M365

Native controls first — use the licensing you already own

NW PDX

Local team, on‑site when it matters

Common Questions

It doesn't have to. We pilot every policy in report‑only mode first, review who would have been blocked and why, communicate ahead of each wave, and roll out by department with a documented rollback. Most organizations complete the transition with a handful of helpdesk tickets rather than an outage.

In most cases the capability is already sitting inside your Microsoft 365 or Entra ID licensing, unconfigured. Our first step is an inventory of what you own. We recommend new spend only where there is a genuine gap — commonly EDR or backup immutability.

Yes. We map the questions to your current control state, tell you plainly where the honest answer is "no," and build a prioritized plan to change those answers. Where a finding has a deadline, we sequence the work to meet it.

We do. Ongoing work typically includes alert monitoring, secure‑score tracking, patch and compliance reporting, quarterly privileged‑access reviews, and an annual tabletop exercise — available on its own or bundled with our managed services.

Need Consultation?

Over 150 businesses are already enhancing their operations and boosting their growth with PDX IT Strategy and Consulting.

If you're still wondering if PDX IT Strategy and Consulting is the right fit for your business, get in touch with our IT experts absolutely for free.

Address

NW Hills, Portland, OR

Call

+1 503-888-0868

Email

abhay@pdxitconsulting.com

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