5 Cybersecurity Tips to Keep Your Information Safe

In today’s technology-based business world, the frequency of cyber attacks is higher than ever before. In order for businesses to combat these attacks, they need to inform themselves of the risks at hand and increase cyber security measures. Large and small companies alike should take a variety of precautions, despite popular belief that large companies are the only ones being targeted. The easiest targets for cybercriminals to detect are unprotected and unexpecting technological devices, which makes all information stored within them at risk. The risk of a security breach can be detrimental to the success of a company and the digital health of its employees and clients. To kickstart your plan for cybersecurity in 2019, follow this list of recommendations to help keep your company and employees safe.

Inform and Educate Employees

One of the first things you can do to set yourself on the path to security online is establishing a knowledge base among your employees. Knowing what risks are at hand will help ensure employees know how to handle situations that are bound to pop up. Teach your employees what email scams and phishing emails look like and what to do when they appear in their inboxes. Spam emails can be defined as unsolicited junk email and are much easier to detect than phishing emails, which are often disguised as emails from well-known organizations. The identifiable aspect of phishing emails causes people to wrongly trust and provide information they wouldn’t normally send to a scammer. Once you’ve informed your employees of these risks, set general rules in place for them to follow. For starters, restrict employees from opening attachments in emails from unconfirmed sources and require that they ask an information technology professional to look over any emails they feel unsure about before responding.

Set Strong Passwords

Following suit with things that employees can actively do to help protect themselves from scammers is creating strong passwords. The use of weak passwords makes email accounts easier for cyber criminals to hack and can be easily avoided. A few tips for creating strong passwords include utilizing both lower and upper case letters, including special characters, and avoiding the use of personal information such as names, birth months or home addresses.

Install Antivirus Systems

Build up your company’s defenses by loading all devices up with anti-spyware and antivirus software and make it more difficult for criminals to access and steal sensitive information. Antivirus allows your team to stay one step ahead of cyber thieves by monitoring potential security holes in devices and reporting on unusual activity the moment it occurs.

Devise a Backup Plan

In order to keep past, present and future company information safe, develop a backup plan for data on hardware before an attack occurs. Streamline this process by implementing an automatic backup system to save your data immediately and as it is updated. Another option is to dedicate one person’s efforts to manually backing all company data up. This should happen daily, if possible, to reduce your risk of losing important documents. Be sure to store copies of all backed up information within another external storage medium, such as the cloud or a USB.

Set Uniform Company Device Security Measures

In today’s working world, employees are able to conduct business on multiple devices every single day. One risk that comes along with these multiple devices is the possibility of information being stolen due to unsecure security measures. It’s important to ensure all work-related devices are in sync and have uniform security precautions in place. Align these security protocols by implementing a secure unified communications suite, which allows you to pick and choose the devices and tools you need. From video conferencing on the computer to opening a document on a cell phone, unified communication tools allow you to do so without compromising security.

Following these cyber security tips is a great starting point for your company to keep its classified information safe going into the new year. From informing your employees of risks to implementing password and other security policies, a lot of these solutions can be done easily and quickly. Help combat the risks of cyber attackers and keep your business running smoothly.