With how much it has advanced, technology is being used by more and more different companies each day. While this has helped with cost-efficiency, productivity and more, it isn’t all positive. Because, as technology advances, so do the tactics of cyber criminals who want nothing more than to take valuable information and data your company holds and uses.
With cyber crime on the rise, it is more important than ever to make sure your company is protected. This article is going to look at a few simple and affordable ways to keep your business safe.
Restrict Access if Possible
If you utilize sensitive information in your day to day operations, as many companies do, there is no reason to allow every employee to access it. The more people that you allow access to private information or data, the higher the chance it has of being compromised. And while hacks do occur, it is actually human error that results in most data breaches or leaks.
So the less access you provide, the less chance someone will forget to log out or accidentally leak information. Not only will this leak lead to a massive drop in customer trust, but these events can cost companies millions of dollars.
Monitor and Manage Your Logs
No matter what type of software you use, there is a good chance that it will produce logs. Logs are a timestamped documentation of events that occur within a particular system. In addition to helping you remain compliant, these logs can also be important when it comes to preventing errors, downtime and hacks.
Now, trying to go through and manually check and manage logs, would be a huge waste of time. Instead, many companies will use log management or monitoring tools. Automatic Syslog analysis and management is great as it can alert you when errors arise and save you from having to search for them yourself, which gives you time to fix them before the issue becomes public.
Use Strong Passwords and 2FA
While this might seem incredibly obvious, you would be surprised at how many employees and individuals use very weak passwords at the office. Using weak passwords is one of the easiest ways to compromise your company or the data you use. Every system, tool and individual at your company should utilize a strong password.
So what is a strong password? Well, there are many different characteristics of strong passwords. Generally, they are decently long, and have a good mix of letters, numbers and symbols. Also, in addition to passwords, you should be sure to use 2FA if possible. It is just a nice extra boost to your security. It will confirm that the person entering a password is truly the person the account belongs to.
Ensure Everyone is Properly Trained
One of the single best ways to exhibit solid security practices at your company is to make sure everyone is trained correctly. Even those who aren’t handling the sensitive information directly should still be trained on how to keep your company safe. There are plenty of third party security training services out there, all with different lessons, features and benefits.
While this might cost your company a bit extra to get specialized security training, it will still be a lot cheaper than getting hacked or suffering a leak because your staff isn’t aware of what to do. Think of it more like an investment. With new best security practices coming out frequently, you might need to train them more than once.
Hopefully the security tips within this article have helped you take the extra steps to protect the information of your staff and customers alike.
