One of the most valuable assets to a company is its data, and many businesses regularly deal with very sensitive data. If this data is compromised or falls into the wrong hands, it can potentially make or break a business.
The right cybersecurity game plan can ensure your business is kept safe from hackers and malicious attacks.
Is Your Business Secure?
The importance of cybersecurity cannot be stressed enough. A cyber-attack can result in theft, loss of data and crucial documents, ransom attempts, and even loss of personal items like photos and identification information.
Businesses don’t want to be caught siting on the sidelines without cybersecurity measures in place. But when living in a time when there are more devices than people, welcoming more innovative hackers than ever, how do we effectively implement these security measures?
An IT professional, whether in-house or outsourced through a provider like Brea Networks, can make all the difference in providing the proper security protocol and systems to protect your business.
According to the technology experts at Cisco, “Three main entities must be protected: endpoint devices like computers, smart devices, and routers; networks; and the cloud. Common technology used to protect these entities include next-generation firewalls, DNS filtering, malware protection, antivirus software, and email security solutions.”
Is your business implementing cybersecurity measures? Is it even important to do so, even if you’re just a small business?
Threats of Cyber Attacks Affect Businesses of ALL Sizes
There is a common misconception that only larger businesses are at risk from cybersecurity threats, but that is far from the truth. Businesses of all sizes are susceptible to cyber-attacks. Small businesses may even be more susceptible due to often having lower cyber defenses and less awareness to threats.
Smaller businesses have access to customer data, just like any other business, and this data can be put at risk by cyber-attacks. Smaller businesses might be smaller, but they usually work with
larger businesses. Hackers can use the smaller business as a way to access the data of the larger business as well. So, it is equally as important for all businesses to know the threats of cyber-attacks and how to prevent them.
What Threats Should Businesses Be on the Lookout for Anyway?
There are a number of technological threats a business can face. But a few of those threats occur far more commonly within businesses.
4 of the most common security threats businesses face are:
1. Phishing Attacks
Phishing attacks are the most common security threat small businesses are facing. These attacks make up 90% of security breaches in businesses. The reason for this is because a phishing email will look like it comes from someone you know, maybe a vendor or even your colleague or boss. It looks real. It looks urgent. So, people click.
These can be one of the trickiest to combat because it comes in the form of an email that looks familiar, but there are defenses that can be put in place against these phishing attacks. Some of these defenses prevent the emails from ever making it to an inbox, others report the attacks and allow them to be deleted from all inboxes. Possibly the best way to protect against phishing attacks is by preventative training with employees showing how to spot and report them.
2. Ransomware Attacks
The most lucrative form of attack, and one the most common is ransomware. Ransomware involves hackers taking a company’s data hostage while demanding a ransom. The hackers will state that the data is encrypted and will be released once the ransom is paid, leaving businesses with a tough choice of whether or not to pay the ransom. The hackers don’t always release the data back to the company once the ransom is paid, leaving the business without all the money they paid and without their precious data.
Small businesses are especially vulnerable to ransomware attacks. They are most likely to pay the ransom because it is common for small businesses to not have their data backed up, meaning that the newly encrypted data that is being held hostage is everything for that business.
Having endpoint protection in place as well as a cloud back-up solution are important measures to have to ensure the protection of the data businesses. The endpoint protection will help protect against an attack ever happening. A back-up solution will ensure that if any data is ever compromised, it can be recovered without having to pay money or lose productivity.
3. Malware Attacks
Malware attacks are incredibly common and can be especially damaging for business as they can take over the network and devices through emails, web downloads, or by unknowingly connecting to an infected device. This allows potential access to company data putting the entire business and its customers at risk.
Ensuring employees do not connect their personal devices to a company network, endpoint protection, and proper web security are a small business’s best bet in fighting malware attacks.
4. Passwords
We all get frustrated when going to a new website or even a commonly used website and having to go through the extensive process of creating a new password that we’re afraid we won’t remember. Well, there’s actually a good reason for that process, protection.
Easily guessed and commonly used passwords are a big target for data breaches. This is seen more often in small businesses because employees haven’t been trained on the importance of strong passwords. Small businesses are also less likely to implement password management software that makes it much more convenient to create, maintain, and store strong passwords.
Are you confident that business is being properly protected from hackers and cyber-attacks?
Get the Right Tech Essentials to Protect Your Business
There are 5 KEY tech essentials every small business needs and can afford. IT professionals like Brea Networks can help implement those key tech essentials and have your business protected against cybersecurity threats.
Make sure your business is up to speed and protected by ensuring these 5 key tech essentials are implemented in your business today:
- Commercial Grade Firewall
- Antivirus and Malware Protection Combo
- Back Your Data DAILY
- Office 365 for Email with 2FA
- Outsource Your IT
Check out Brea Networks to learn more about how outsourcing your IT fully or working in collaboration with a qualified IT company can help protect your business and prevent costly attacks.
