Boosting the security of your business is in your hands

On average, a hacker attacks a system every 39 seconds and most of the time, the victims are small business owners.

Security breaches have become so common nowadays that businesses who don’t take adequate measures to toughen their security fall easy prey to hackers who can easily steal their business data.

Take these five security measures to strengthen your business security and defend it against cyber attacks:

1. Train your employees

Did you know that around 95 per cent of breaches start with a human error?

Hence, it is important to create a culture of cybersecurity where all the employees know how to keep their data safe and also know how to react in case of a data breach.

No matter how small or large your business is, it is crucial to create security policies and follow the best practices to keep your systems secure.

Educate and provide proper training to your employees so that detecting and responding to attacks becomes easier.

You can perform “live fire” training exercises where a demo attack is launched and employees are trained to combat such attacks.

Besides, you can invest in security training programs where mentors can train your employees on a six-monthly basis in order to upgrade their security skills.

2. Install software updates on a regular basis

Old versions of software that you are currently using can make your systems vulnerable to cyber theft or other forms of cyber attacks.

Patching your software with security patches that are released by software companies allow you to repair critical vulnerabilities in your network.

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By deploying a patch management process, you will be able to keep your systems secure against potential threats.

Hence, it is important to regularly update your computers and laptops and keep the software up-to-date so that no major lapse in security happens.

3. Implement comprehensive mobile security strategies

Malicious codes on mobile devices are one of the biggest threats affecting SMB’s.

A survey by IBM revealed that around 67 per cent of businesses allow their employees to download third-party apps on their work devices.

You need to stop this practice right away because organizations often take appropriate steps to fasten the security of their systems but fail to boost up the security of mobile devices. Hackers are able to capitalize on this security flaw and cause a lot of damage.

Hence, it is important to implement a comprehensive mobile security policy that can restrict the access of confidential data by third-party apps.

This is much more than just device management.

4. Create e-signatures

Forget the old practice of scanning, printing and email copies of sensitive data in order to exchange signatures.

Sending confidential data via email poses a security risk because hackers might access the email data, copy your signature and use it for unethical activities.

Instead, use an e-signature as it is much more secure than a physical signature.

An e-signature is secured by an encryption technology that is used to verify the signature. Moreover, an e-signature is sealed against tampering.

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Hence, no one can edit the document once it has been signed, as doing so will render the document invalid.

5. Use a cloud-based storage

It is recommended to invest in cloud storage services like DropBox because it helps to store all your data over cloud — you don’t have to worry about data loss in the event of natural disasters.

Above all, these cloud-based services keep track of who accessed your data and when.

Furthermore, you can control the level of access you want to grant to specific users.

For example, you might want your co-workers to have full editorial access to specific files while granting view-only access to other users who shouldn’t have the ability to edit the data in the document.

Lastly, these cloud-based solutions also record all activity that has taken place in a document’s working environment.

This naturally enhances governance and security since you have full auditing abilities.

Final thoughts

Boosting the security of your business is in your hands.

You need to take adequate steps to secure the data, systems and your entire office premises in order to minimize the risk of breaches.

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Image Credits: lsantilli

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