As we head into another year, the world of business is not set to become any less reliant on the tech that helps us manage our teams, do our work, and make valuable insights from the data that we gather. Our IT setup is likely to keep playing a vital role in the workplace, which means that it also demands vigilance and active security measures to ensure that we’re not vulnerable to cybercrime as well. Here, we’re going to look at some of the most common cybersecurity mistakes businesses tend to make, and how you can make sure you don’t suffer from the same.
Assuming You’re Not A Target
A lot of companies make the mistake of assuming that they’re too small or unimportant to be targeted by cybercriminals. While there are, no doubt, those who go after the biggest fish possible, small and mid-sized businesses are more typically the most preferred targets, because they tend to have fewer security measures in place. What’s more, many automated methods of attack, like phishing and ransomware, don’t discriminate who they target; they simply aim to reach as many businesses as possible. For criminals, it’s often about an easy score, not how big your brand is. Smaller businesses tend to suffer more from these attacks, too, which means there’s even more reason to be highly vigilant.
Not Training Employees On The Risks
While there are plenty of tech solutions you can implement to protect your systems, these can easily be undermined by an employee who doesn’t recognize tech threats and might leave the door open for exploits and hackers. Cybersecurity training should be mandatory for anyone who uses digital technology in the workplace, ensuring that they’re a lot less likely to click on malicious links, download infected attachments, or share sensitive information with criminals who pose as legitimate contacts. To those who know a little more about cybercrime, these might sound like common-sense precautions, but you can’t expect every member of your team to be as aware of those risks as you might be.
Not Keeping Your Systems Up-To-Date
One of the easiest backdoors you can leave open for would-be cyber-criminals is by not keeping your software, operating system, and other digital systems up-to-date. Aside from the various bug fixes and functional improvements that patches are designed to deliver, they also actively address known exploits and security issues in the tools that you work with. Older versions of the software, as a result, are often more vulnerable, and those vulnerabilities are more widely known by criminals. As such, you should ensure that you schedule some time throughout the week to update all of the software across your systems with whatever patches are available. You can also automate patch management and schedule updates to do it without the need for manual input.
Skipping Multi-Factor Authentication
How you allow your workers to access the tools and data they use for their work is important, as well. If all you rely on is a username and a password, then this could open the door for someone to steal those credentials (through phishing scams, for instance) and get easy access to your digital systems. Even stronger passwords can often be undermined by data breaches or brute-force attacks. Multi-factor authentication (or MFA) adds another layer of protection, as it requires your workers to provide an extra method of verification of who they are. This can be done through using a code sent to their mobile device, a biometric scan, or the use of an authenticator app. As such, even if their credentials are stolen, without the secondary method of backing up who they are, would-be intruders can be kept out of your systems and data.
Not Disposing Of Your Devices And Data Correctly
When it comes time to say goodbye to old devices, whether you’re selling them, donating them, or throwing them away, you should make sure that they don’t have any sensitive data lingering on them that can inadvertently end up in the wrong hands. This goes for computers and hard drives, but also printers and mobile devices. Deleting those files or performing a system reset isn’t enough to fully prevent data recovery. To ensure complete and secure data destruction, you should utilize professional electronic disposal and recycling services. These can make sure that data is permanently erased when possible, or physically destroyed while ensuring that you’re in keeping with environmental regulations.
Not Having A Clear Response Plan
If you’re coming up with a response to a breach or other cyber emergency incident, then you’re acting too late. It’s a good idea to have a documented incident response plan at the ready long before any incident might actually happen. This can help you assign roles, ensuring that people know what steps to take and how to communicate in the event of a breach. If everyone already knows what actions they’re supposed to take, then it can allow for much more prompt responses, which can shut down systems quicker, close breaches, and assess the damage before it’s allowed to spread much further.
Treating Cybersecurity Like A One-Time Thing
The most important thing to remember about cybersecurity is that it’s an ever-evolving field. New tech and insights can help you better protect your systems now, but criminals get more sophisticated and find new methods of breaching those systems over time. As threats evolve constantly, so should your approach. This means taking the time to routinely go over the rising threats in the digital world, and what steps your tech you can implement to protect your business. It also means that training should be ongoing and recurring for your employees, keeping them up-to-date with the latest threats they might face and refreshing their knowledge so that they can stay vigilant.
With the tips above, you can make sure that you’re setting the right course to keep your tech and your data as well safeguarded as possible. Cybersecurity should be an ongoing, ever-present concern. As soon as you start getting complacent, the risk increases several times over.
