Protect your Business From Cyber Security Threats: 4 Smart Ways

It seems as if cybersecurity threats are both sophisticated and ever-present these days, something that can indeed make those of us owning and running businesses incredibly concerned. The good news is that there are several strategies that you can use to protect your business from such threats. Keep reading to find out what they are.

Update your systems

Out of date systems provide weaknesses for hackers to exploit, that is why it’s hugely important to update your systems regularly. Indeed periodically updating your systems and software is a low-cost solution that can help you stay on top of the ever-evolving cybersecurity threat that hackers pose.

You don’t even have to update your systems manually, as you can use a patch management system to do it for you.

Make use of penetration testing.

Similarly, as well as updating your systems using penetration testing to identify any weaknesses in your IT provision is a brilliant idea indeed. The reason is that once you have found where the problems lie, you can have your team working on fixing them before they are discovered and used by anyone with nefarious intentions.

There are many different Types of Penetration Testing to consider as well, and it helps to know the difference between grey, white, and black-box testing if you want to perform the most useful tests for your business. The good news is it’s not hard to remember as black-box testing is all about external testing, while white is about internal, grey, on the other hand, is a mixture of them both.

Properly train staff in IT security

Sadly, people inside of your business can also contribute to cybersecurity concerns. In particular, employees not sticking to IT security protocol like using only secure networks, not bringing it USB sticks can be problematic.

Additionally, phishing emails are becoming more and more convincing all the time. Therefore you must educate your employees on how to spot these, and how to weed them out.

The most important thing to remember here is that if something seems off, it probably is and therefore it is worth checking up on through an official route. This means using a phone number other than the one provided in the suspicious email to check that the request for information or money is genuine.

Also, ask your employees to check the email address, and the link contained within any suspicious communication. If they do not seem official or legit, then you can direct them to take the advice above.

We also recommend that you send them on training courses that deal with more detailed and complex parts of IT security. For example, while not directly a security problem, your business should be looking into decentralized identities so that you are not beholden to a specific service provider, but rather manage this yourself. This is safer for your business, but you need employees who understand the process, and what this means.

Finally, do not forget to remind them to report any suspicious emails to your IT department. Then you can warn the rest of your workers to be on guard for them, and even have your IT folks protect against something similar in the future.

Always have a back up

Lastly, while it is better to be proactive when dealing with cybersecurity threats, it is also essential to have a backup plan. Indeed, a literal backup of your data and servers are what is required here. Although whether you choose to do this onsite, or via the cloud will depend on what will better keep your company safe.