You are worried about cyberattacks and security breaches, and rightfully so. The increasing number of data theft incidents and breaches, on small businesses in particular, is a matter of global concern. If you are wondering what you can do better to address threats, risks, and security concerns, we have a few steps below that may come in handy.
- Create a comprehensive cybersecurity plan. Compliance is an aspect about cybersecurity that businesses cannot take for granted. We strongly recommend that you consider seeking help on creating a complete plan for better cybersecurity¸ which also addresses compliance.
- Focus on employee training. Your employees are eventually on the frontlines for ensuring security of IT resources, and they must be trained for cybersecurity. You can conduct workshops, webinars, and training programs, so that they are aware of the risks and concerns.
- Spend on antimalware software. Malware, phishing, and ransomware are serious small business threats, and you can tackle most of them by opting for antimalware software. There are some good programs out there, and the best ones are paid, but worth the price.
- Network segmentation is a great tool. If you want to minimize the impact of a cybersecurity breach, ensure that you segment your resources on subnetworks, so that compromise on one doesn’t impact others.
- All networked devices, including personal devices and IP cameras, should be protected with firewalls. Most operating systems do have a built-in firewall, but check if you can add extra protection.
- Use added means of authentication. The importance of strong passwords cannot be overstated, but what is as important is authentication. Ensure that you have multifactor authentication where needed, which could be in form of security questions or onetime passwords.
- Use the lockout feature. When it comes to brute force attacks, lockout feature is quite useful. The feature will lock an account or device when someone tries to use a wrong password for a few times, typically three times or more.
- Consider a good password management tool. You cannot expect your employees to remember so many complex passwords. Consider recommending them a password manager, which can create, retrieved and protect passwords securely.
- Follow the safe browsing norms at workplace. Ask employees to report phishing mails and state the dos and don’ts of browsing the internet. Also, if your employees are not using a spam filter and ad blocker as yet, you may consider recommending them one.
Review your cybersecurity practices now!
