Getting Cyber Security Right At Your Business

Cyber security is at risk every day. The threat of cybercrime happening in business becomes a bigger risk and hardly a day passes without some business experiencing it. 

The news is full of stories about the theft of data or breaches happening. Cybercrime became a lucrative business and there are individuals and syndicates out there planning on how to commit it more efficiently. This makes it necessary that all businesses, from the smallest to the largest, must be vigilant and ensure that they are cyber secure.

All businesses employ staff, and this is where a successful cybersecurity strategy should start. If your employees are not on board with the cybersecurity strategy and plan of a business, it is bound to fail in protecting against the threat of a cybercrime attack. This guide will look at steps on how employees can get on board with cyber security.

Bring in an experienced team of cyber experts

There is only one place to begin, and this is by bringing in a team of security experts. This could be something that you do on a full-time basis or it could be something that you do on a periodic basis in order to ensure that your systems are secure and your team is educated. 

When it comes to cyber security, there is no denying that this is one of the fastest growing job industries in the US. The demand for specialists is high, and so you can expect to pay a premium to have someone employed by your business. Nevertheless, most people would agree that it is worth it. After all, employing a cybersecurity company could end up saving your own business thousands and even millions of pounds by ensuring that hackers are not able to gain control of your network. 

If you are not able to afford to add a cyber security specialist or team to your workforce, you do have the option of outsourcing your security requirements. If you do this, make sure you take the time and effort to find a business that has a great reputation in the industry and has worked on many different security projects before. Make sure that they have the required qualifications and that they can be trusted when it comes to protecting your company. After all, your data is going to be in their hands. Plus, at the same time, if a breach were to happen, you would not be able to pass on the responsibility to the cyber company; you would still be to blame.

Evaluate your vulnerability in terms of a cyberattack

The next step should be to know the company’s strengths and weaknesses with regard to cyber security. Ask yourself the question: “How vulnerable are we to an attack?” Get the personnel to all join in answering the question if possible. If the group would be too large, split them up in their different sections and let them deal with the question.

Become familiar with your router management. A user can easily manage and change necessary network settings by logging into 192.168.1.1 using the appropriate username and password. It also helps one to troubleshoot the router if any problems occur.

This will enable the business to get a very good grasp of their vulnerable areas, what type of data the business handles and stores. Identify the most important data and where it is stored and what the effect would be if it is lost or breached. What would the effect be if it gets lost or stolen on all stakeholders, the business, employees, service providers, and customers? Will the business be able to continue in its current form? It generally makes a lot of sense to invest in vulnerability management services.

Benefits of involving employees

The purpose of involving the employees is two-fold: they are the ones working with the data and have a very good grasp of how cybersecurity is treated in the business. Secondly, this ensures that they are part of the process of ensuring that the strategy developed will be implemented. Without their buy-in, no strategy will be successfully implemented. It only takes one person to click on an unsafe link or send data on an unsecured connection to open the way for cybercrime to become a reality in your business. The flip side is also true if your employees are cyber smart they form an effective wall of defense against any cyber attack.

Provide an environment that is oriented towards cyber security

The working environment should be geared towards the promotion of cybersecurity and this is where management plays a major role to motivate employees. If they only pay lip service to protect the business against threats, the employees will do the same. This starts with their personal display of being conscious of the role that cybersecurity plays if their communication is not secured. Don’t expect the employees to adhere to guidelines and security measures if you don’t show concern. If the business doesn’t budget to implement measures like using encryption to ensure all data can be safely transmitted but rather spends money on other low priority items employees will not be motivated to pay particular attention to security.

Ensure that all computers and are protected

These are the devices used to connect to the internet and your business’ local network and they must be protected against a cyber attack. The following must be done and upgraded on a regular basis and employees must be made aware of it:

• Update your software to the latest version and ensures that if the developer issue warnings about security issues they are adhered to.
• Install the best antivirus software that the business can afford and ensure that it is regularly updated. Protect the business by constantly alerting the employees to maintain their vigilance in this regard by not opening a suspicious email or clicking on links to open suspect files.
• Use a Firewall to help guard against possible cyber attacks.
• Protect data by making regular backups. Ensure that this becomes a company culture, do it daily. Encrypt data that are stored in the Cloud.
• Protect your computers and devices with strong passwords, which are regularly changed.
• Ensure those permissions in place and curb the number of administrators on your system and ensure that employees have their own login and passwords.
• Establish special procedures for laptops and mobile devices when they connect to your network in terms of antivirus and other software. 
• Ensure that all employees are aware of possible threats by keeping them informed and reminded of what behaviour might constitute a risk.

The benefits of using VPNs in the business

A Virtual Private Network or VPN refers to a function where a private computer network is used on a public network to send and receive data on as if the devices used are directly linked to each other in a secure, private connection which the users on the public network can’t see. In practice, this enables a user of the private network to send data from a remote location to the server of the business to send or receive data. The data will be secured.

The following benefits can accrue to the business when using VPNs…

• Data that is remotely collected or generated can be protected and safely send to the business via the protected network using a secure connection.
• The employees can browse the internet safely and do their searches without their IP addresses becoming public and their searches can be masked to protect against hackers.
• Mobile devices and laptops can be protected by installing the VPN’s on the office router through which all the devices can connect to the internet.

So there you have it: everything you need to know about getting cyber security right at your business!