6 Steps to Protect Your Business Against Hackers
With business increasingly being performed online, the ease of data transactions also opens a new world of vulnerability. Hackers are everywhere, and whether they’re motivated by your data, or your money, chances are, your business could fall victim to one of them sooner or later.
The good news is, the Technical Framework Fort Collins IT Consulting and Support team have come up with six preventative measures you can implement today to help resist intrusion and protect your IT framework.
1. The devices you never expected
Every device you allow to connect to your network could potentially invite your downfall. That means printers that access your network, and employee devices that connect wirelessly, could all have a vulnerability that could put your whole operation at risk. The most immediate risk is unsecured connections, putting your day-to-day business dealings in unwanted hands. Although there is no way of completely preventing third-party intrusions, one way of minimizing it is to ensure anti-malware is installed on all devices connecting to your network.
2. Phish out of water
Some of the largest hacking attacks on organizations around the world, aren’t really that sophisticated. Phishing is the act of acquiring information by misrepresenting your identity. This most commonly occurs by email, but can happen via phone calls. A phishing attack would generally fool you, or someone in your business, into handing over sensitive information such as usernames and passwords. This occurs when a phisher masks their email address and identifiers as someone from your company (or even a client), and requests account information. Once this information is granted, your security has been compromised. A good way to combat this, is to set policies that ensure everyone at your business, and your clients and other contacts are never to request sensitive information via email or phone.
3. Security software
If you’re using commercial security software designed for everyday consumers to protect your business, it’s definitely time to upgrade. Anti-virus software for personal computers is only designed to protect users from everyday attacks, and not designed to drive comprehensive security. Invest in some corporate or enterprise-grade software to help secure your servers and general network. Remember, ignoring those upgrade notifications could become your undoing – they keep your security software protecting you from new threats born every day.
4. Scramble your sensitive files
Encryption should be a common occurrence at your workplace. Encryption takes any data you select, and scrambles it into unreadable chunks of characters. This ensures that if your network is ever compromised, the files an attacker steals may be nothing more to them than blocks of useless garbage that mean nothing.
5. Make security everyone’s responsibility
Creating safe IT usage guidelines and distributing it to your workforce is a great way to ensure everyone is aware of how to use your network safely. These guidelines could include known malware sites, rules about logging in and out of your account when stepping away from your desk, and the importance of password strength and variety. If you need help with these, speak to our Technical Framework Fort Collins IT Consulting and Support team.
6. Audit security regularly
You could have all the measures imaginable to protect your business, but at the end of the day, it only takes your weakest link to bring it all crashing down. Make it your personal responsibility to stay on top of your workplace security, and perform audits on every facet of your network to expose weaknesses, holes, and other glitches. If you, or someone in your workplace experience something slightly out of the ordinary, make it best practice to report and act on these immediately.
