While we still struggle to sail through the COVID-19 pandemic, digitalization has become part of every activity in our lives. Businesses, education, entertainment, each activity saw a quick transition to a digital platform.
With the increased internet activity, data breaches, online identity theft, ransomware, and many more complex cyber crimes have become the most cause of concern and anxiety both to individuals and businesses alike. According to a study by Barracuda 46% of organizations, that is almost half, experienced at least one cyberattack during Covid-19 lockdown, since they work from home model started.
Although a lot is being done to create awareness among internet users and some businesses, have started investing in cybersecurity policies. But there are still others like individuals with online projects and some medium and small organizations who think they can never be targets of cybercriminals. This thinking needs to change as hackers are smart enough to realize that small businesses are not so alert regarding cybersecurity, nor do they have big cybersecurity budgets like big organizations. So, small enterprises become the soft targets of hackers and the financial burden incurred on them due to any hacking attempt may prove devastating. They can even pose challenges for their very survival.
Hence, it is crucial for everyone alike to first be aware of the most common cyber security mistakes you are making and then work towards countering them and taking appropriate security measures proactively. To protect your business from cyber attacks you must hire experts like Disruptive Innovations because they provide all the services which help you to stay away from hackers. Let us now try to look into them and find simple but effective solutions.
Not Creating Awareness Regarding Cyber Security
Please do not assume that since you as a business owner are serious about cybersecurity, your employees will also be; they can be casual about cybersecurity practices. You can only make them understand that the seriousness of the cyber threat to your business is real and that they need to follow the company’s cybersecurity guidelines strictly.
Although cybersecurity training for all your employees is a must, to carry out role-specific cybersecurity training is more effective in securing your website. So, identifying who all are handling sensitive areas of the website like databases, separate security analysis of the process involved in their work should be done. These employees should be made aware of the specific security measures to be taken while on the job.
Not Limiting User Access
One of the most commonly committed mistakes, especially in small organizations, is to give complete access to your system to all your employees or users. This should never be practiced.
Instead, it is always advisable to limit roles and permissions given to users or employees. They should be given access to areas that are just sufficient for them to carry out their specific functions in running the website and no more. Only those employees should be given access to a crucial system database who are responsible for its maintenance.
No Proper Password Management System
Not using strong passwords, and using the same password, username for all the employees can have serious consequences and can become your most weak link for hackers.
The use of strong passwords is a fundamental security practice that all users must follow. Your password should include a special character, numbers, at least one uppercase character. Passwords should be allotted to employees following the roles they perform like the most robust passwords could be kept for those involved in maintaining crucial data of the website.
Not Securing Your Website with SSL Certificate and visiting sites not secured by SSL Certificate.
Not securing your website with Secure Socket Layer (SSL) Certificate is like putting your business’s whole future at stake. Your website stores so much of the company’s and users’ crucial data which could be targeted by hackers and the entire website could be compromised, leading to heavy financial losses. SSL Certificate security for your website provides a secured encrypted path for data exchange between the user’s browser and the webserver. It also provides authentication to the website and builds trust with the users that their data is safe and helps in conversions. You must also buy cheap SSL Certificate from many reputed SSL Certificate providers to secure your website as per your security needs and budget.
Visiting websites without checking whether it is SSL Certificate secured or not is putting your sensitive information at stake. Before visiting any website, you must look for the padlock symbol or HTTPS before the URL, visual confirmation of the secured website with an SSL Certificate.
Lack Of Awareness Regarding Phishing emails
Not being aware of phishing emails and clicking on the links without checking it, is the most common mistake by users or employees. It would help if you educate your employees to look for signs to identify phishing emails. These mails usually seem to come from very trusted sources like some corporate banks or someone known to you or showing some verification error always showing some urgency and urging you to log in to your account or clicking on the link sent. You should never click on the link; instead, you can log in to your website yourself.
Not Keeping up With Software Updates
Showing casualness and delaying software updates, could cost you heavily as hackers could see this as an opportunity to hack into your database and cause serious damage.
You should update to the latest version of CMS used for your website as the new version covers all the security patches that might have existed in the older version. Regular updates must be taken for the operating system of all the systems in the organization. Updating the antivirus will fix all the vulnerable points and keep you safe from a data breach.
Not Creating Backups Regularly
Not creating data backups regularly can be fatal for the business. If system files get corrupted in case of any data breach, the whole business can come to a halt. So, it should be taken up as a part of the company’s cybersecurity policy to most importantly create frequent backups of all data across the organization. There should also be clear plans of the data storage process so that systems can be restored quickly in case of any data breach.
In Conclusion
With every activity of our lives being digitized, there is a lot of data on the internet; it becomes crucial to keep this data safe so that it does not fall prey to hackers and is misused. So, it becomes your responsibility both as an individual or as an organization, that you pay utmost attention to best cybersecurity practices.
