(Akiit.com) Now, more than ever, cybersecurity is absolutely key for the success of your business. Cyber criminals have been out to attack your business at the best of times – trying to steal data which can put you, your employees, your clients and your business’ reputation at risk. But they’re particularly active right now. Why? Well, the coronavirus pandemic has seen the vast majority of traditional office workers switch to remote working. Hackers and cybercriminals are aware that a huge number of people are operating in new environments, on unsecured networks without supervision from managers and other authority figures. It’s now that they’re most likely to be able to cause the most damage to your company. This is why you’re going to have to really focus on cybersecurity for the foreseeable future. Here’s a little more information on the subject to help you along the way!
Ensure Employees are Using a VPN and Firewall
As we’ve established, hacking is on the rise right now. When your employees work from home, they may automatically connect to their home
networks, which are much easier to infiltrate than corporate networks. This is why you need to set up a VPN and ensure that all employees know that they must connect to this when they are working. You should also ensure that a firewall is present on all employees’ devices. Generally speaking, it’s best to provide your employees with laptop or tablets to work from rather than leaving them to use their own devices. This way, you know that their work devices have all of the right software to protect your files and data.
Train Your Staff
Being aware of how cyber criminals operate and what cyber attacks look like could reduce your employees’ chances of catering to cyber criminals’ needs. So, make sure to fully train your staff. Whether that’s with small training programmes or a cyber security degree. Phishing tends to be one of most commonly employed methods that hackers use to gain access to your business, systems and your business’ data. This is basically the use of deceptive emails and websites to gain protected or personal information. Phishing can be quite simple to spot if you know what you’re looking for. For example, your staff should know to keep a lookout for:
- Bad spelling and grammar
- Generic greetings (such as “sir” or “madam” rather than a name)
- Direct requests to click links or provide personal information
- Obscure or misspelled email addresses (such as help@paypel.com)
It’s important that you don’t just train your staff once. Information is easy to forget and cyber criminals’ techniques and methods are always changing. Keep up to date and make sure to retrain your staff or refresh their knowledge on a regular basis.
As you can see, cybersecurity is on the rise and every company is at risk. Wherever there is vulnerability, cyber criminals will attack – and the vast majority of businesses are pretty vulnerable right now. Hopefully, some of the above information will help you to protect your business as best possible!
Staff Writer; Larry Brown