Cybersecurity: 7 Steps Your Business Can Take To Be Even Safer

Last year was a year full of news about cyberattacks, phishing scams and ransomware attacks. While you may be forgiven in thinking that hackers mainly target large-scale businesses because of the media coverage, in truth 71% of all attacks actually target SME’s. The reason? A lack of investment in cybersecurity.

In 2018 no business large or small is safe from attacks, with security experts predicting attacks of smarter and larger scales. The growth of IoT makes it so that businesses need to focus on all access points as they are now vulnerable in multiple areas. According to expert predictions, by 2020 there will be more than 20 billion IoT devices globally, so the cybersecurity risk will only become more of an issue for businesses.

On the other hand, fines are also on the horizon for regulated organisations if they don’t manage to prevent breaches. Not only do businesses need to deter cyberattacks they must also adhere to compliance standards.

So, all in all, a question is posed: has your business done everything possible to stop cyberattacks? We take a look at the measures your organisation can adopt to be even safer.

1. Take the time to perform a cybersecurity self-assessment. Objectively measure security risks across roles and teams, taking into account all the platforms, the range of clouds and IT infrastructure.
2. Compile and implement cybersecurity awareness training for your employees both new and current that discuss areas such as proper use of e-mails, suspicious items, and data integrity amongst other topics.
3. Every six months try and conduct an internal review and bring a security consultant in once a year.
4. Make sure that you document all of your security efforts. This will help if you ever need to respond quickly to a security breach.
5. Take note of and understand all your liability borne from security breaches stipulated in contracts with clients.
6. Conduct proper device audits of what each employee has been given. Ensure that regular inventories are taken and also make sure that there are several security checkpoints for company devices taken off-site.
7. Detail an incident response plan in case you do get targeted. It’s important to know exactly what steps to take in order to keep disruption to a minimum!

If you take these steps towards better cybersecurity, you will be better positioned to respond to breaches. What else do you think businesses should do? Let us know in the comments!