4 Best Cybersecurity Practices To Adopt For Your Business
According to IBM’s data breach report, in the 17-year history report, the highest average total cost of a data breach is USD$4.24 million. Moreover, apart from the immediate costs like regulatory fines and data loss, companies also experience stained business reputations, a loss of customers’ trust, and a loss of business. Best Cybersecurity Practices
Many small and mid-size companies go bankrupt within six months of a cyberattack, making cybersecurity practices exceptionally relevant.
To help you prevent cybersecurity threats, below are among the best cybersecurity practices you can adopt for your business.
1. Outsource Cybersecurity Services Best Cybersecurity Practices
Businesspeople outsource cybersecurity services for several reasons. For instance, they might be aiming to save the cost of employing an internal cybersecurity unit or trying to address the demand for efficient and trustworthy cybersecurity management services that they can’t provide for their business. Whatever objective you have, it’s efficient and cost-effective to outsource your data security so your in-house IT department can focus on much more significant tasks. Working with an outsourcing company like IT consulting in Chicago with Outsource IT Solutions Group and other similar companies can help ensure your business data, critical systems, and vulnerability access points are protected.
Keep in mind that the in-depth knowledge and skills needed to determine and respond to cybersecurity threats can extend beyond what you have within your internal IT team. Outsourcing to a reliable IT service provider alleviates the stress of securing business data and provides peace of mind recognizing that you have a dedicated team of experts prepared to prevent cyber threats. With outsourced IT service providers, you can minimize cybersecurity threats like data breaches by revealing blinds within your internal security unit with outsourced IT service providers.
2. Perform Vulnerability Assessment
Vulnerability assessment has become even more crucial to a company’s stability and continuity. The main goal of this cybersecurity practice is to determine and assess the gravity of the flaws in a company’s IT infrastructure. This process usually involves utilizing different testing devices like network scanners and web security. One of the primary benefits of performing a vulnerability assessment is that it verifies the effectiveness of existing security protections and system updates and upgrades. It also provides a measurable value to the internal control risk and sensitive data encountered in the case of a data breach.
Furthermore, vulnerability assessment offers detailed instruction to identify existing flaws and prevent cyberattacks. It can also help improve your business reputation and encourage great trust among customers. A vulnerability assessment can help preserve the integrity of assets if there’s any malicious code hidden in any of the assets. Moreover, it helps reach and maintain compliance with any national and international cybersecurity rules that may apply.
3. Doing Software Updates
Given that your operating system manages all the functionality of your business software, it can be an exposed target for cybercriminals. If you don’t keep your software up-to-date, you leave your business vulnerable to losing the data on your device or comprising access to critical business accounts. But the good thing is, that updating your business software is one of the most manageable ways to protect your business from cyberattacks.
On top of better security, software updates usually provide new features and speed improvement to build a better user experience. Software developers are continuously improving their software to deliver greater productivity to end-users. For instance, your sales and marketing department can rely on software to work and communicate with clients and leads remotely in multiple ways. That’s why performing regular software updates should be one of the cybersecurity practices you should adopt.
4. Carry Out Data Backups
Business data is a critical element of running a business. Many businesspeople depend on data backups to ensure that their assets are safe from cybersecurity threats. They do it because losing data can cost you a significant amount of money. Having reliable data backups is one of the most effective cybersecurity practices to avoid long-term harm after cybersecurity threats. For instance, suppose your business encounters a ransomware attack. With high-quality backups and all your data encrypted, you may only be susceptible to losing roughly one week’s worth of business data.
Furthermore, business backups are crucial to ensure your business is safe in the event of natural disasters, hardware failures, and cyberattacks. Depending on how much data is lost, it may be impossible for your business to resolve them. For that reason, you should perform data backups regularly, and you should store the business data in various places outside of the hardware that the original data kept on. In other words, you should have local and offsite data backups.
Conclusion
Overall, paying attention to the best practices to adopt for your business plays a critical role in supporting the growth of your business. In addition to hiring IT services for your business, vulnerability assessment, performing regular software updates, and doing data backups, you should also track the execution of your cybersecurity practices to ensure better security. Tracking your cybersecurity efforts allows you to adapt to the best strategies that your business needs.
