All types of businesses have some digital data that they have to protect. More than 60% of small- and medium-sized businesses fall prey to cyberattacks because they do not secure their data. As of 2020, the average cost of a data breach is $150 per record. Can businesses afford to lose that much money? Cybercriminals attack small organizations in particular because they do not have the sophisticated security system that bigger enterprises have.
This is a common misconception among small- and medium-sized enterprises. They do not think they have to invest in the security of their digital assets because “who would target a small business, anyway?” But the truth is that cybercriminals practice targeting small businesses because their systems are easy to breach.
What have you been doing for your business? While marketing, advertising, and social media are all critical to the success of your business, one cyber attack can spell disaster for the whole organization. You need to take the necessary steps and make the right investments to protect your business assets and understand the risks that your business is facing.
Streamline Your Processes
Does your business still keep a physical infrastructure for your servers, routers, firewalls, application delivery systems, and storage systems? There are plenty of benefits for physical control and access to the storage of your information. However, there are a lot of downsides, too. For example, if you want to expand your network and add to your servers, you will need to add to your physical space, too. Not only is this costly, but it is also a hassle for businesses.
Physical infrastructures are not built with scalability in mind. If you have goals of growing your business, you need to transition to a VDC cloud server. Virtual data centers are online infrastructures for your servers, systems, routers, and firewalls. This enables businesses to create virtual machines and networks, as well as manage resources such as memory, storage, and bandwidth.
Save Only What’s Necessary
The more information you collect from employees and customers, the more data you have to protect. Ask only what is necessary. Collect only the information you need. This will help you store the data easier. Remember that in the case of a data breach, the more vulnerable victims are your clients. They’re the ones who do not have control over what you accidentally leaked. They trusted your business to protect their information. While your business will also suffer, the fault is yours directly.
List Down Your Assets
What are your digital assets? Your clients’ personal and financial records are your company’s assets. It means they trusted you to protect these. Photos, videos, blogs, journals, software, systems, and apps are digital assets, too. How can you know what you must protect when you do not have a list of them? You will surely miss out on a thing or two. These are all valuable to your company. And while customer information per se does not generate money, it is the most valuable digital asset an organization can have because it represents trust.
Passwords Should Be Longer and Stronger
Strong passwords will protect your business from hacking. Yes, it’s as simple as that. Train your employees in creating strong passwords and make sure to change these regularly. Limit also the number of employees that can access certain information from your system. The fewer people know the passwords and passcodes in your systems, the more protected your business’ digital assets are.
What makes a good password? It should not contain personal information about you. Passwords should be at least seven characters long, and they should contain characters, numbers, lower-case letters, and upper-case letters.
Set Internal Controls Against Employee Fraud
The biggest mistake a business can make is to trust its employees blindly. While there is a certain trust that is demanded between employers and employees, you must still set internal controls to protect your digital assets. Employees can be tempted to misuse company funds for their own good. They can also steal customer information and sell them to cybercriminals.
Make sure that there is a system in place to log what information your employees are accessing. Set up tasks and segregate duties. No one employee should have access to all information in your system.
Give your business maximum protection by ensuring that you have all systems in place. You must train your employees well, too, and make sure they are aware of the dangers of cybercrimes. This is your responsibility both to your business and to the clients who support you.
