Understanding Cybersecurity and Its Impact on Your Business – Part II

A multi-million dollar company or a business startup can be vulnerable to a number of attacks, and they aren’t only physical. The growing availability of personal details to the internet through cloud services is a significant driver of cybercrime. 

Cybercriminals are getting more skilled, altering their targets, impacting businesses, and the techniques they use to attack various security systems. Another critical aspect is that some businesses, even large corporations, neglect training workers about potential cyber intrusions. That often gives many workers the assumption that only the IT department should have been aware of cybersecurity. Most think that IT people are the only remedy for any attack that may occur in the business; however, this is not the case.

Employees are often the targets of cyberattacks that begin with a simple email. It should be worth noting that some of the most devastating cyberattacks in history occurred because an employee received a phishing email. An employee viewed it and clicked on the malicious link, and compromised numerous consumers’ data. 

How Can Cyber Attacks Impact a Business? 

Unfortunately, some business owners assume that their enterprises are too modest for hackers to take notice. Even so, no one is immune to these online dangers. The inability to strengthen any company’s cybersecurity may enable cybercriminals to undermine data integrity and create mistrust in an organization or government. Moreover, here are some notable impacts cyberattacks can do on a particular business: 

• Economic cost – Intellectual property theft, business information theft, trade interruption, and the expense of restoring damaged systems

• Regulatory cost – Because of GDPR and other data breach regulations, a company may face regulatory penalties or punishments as a consequence of cybercrime

• Reputational cost – Consumer dissatisfaction, loss of existing and prospective consumers to rivals, and inadequate media coverage

Ways to Equip Your Company from Any Cyberattack

While you cannot dodge all the cyberattacks coming your way, you can always minimize damage. Here are some approaches business should consider to improve their cybersecurity measures:

• Integrate Cybersecurity Practices during Onboarding Processes

Evaluate the onboarding process, and if it does not incorporate any cybersecurity awareness, then now is the time to include it. Have your IT department participate in the onboarding activity so that everything is adequately presented. You must instill in the new workers the significance and severity of cyber risks to take them seriously. Because most of them are still adjusting to their new jobs and environments, cybersecurity may be daunting, and some may dismiss it if it is not adequately reinforced.

Suppose they are not educated and trained on appropriate cybersecurity etiquette; they will most likely become the weakest link in your business. They can easily fall as the first victim when an attack happens.

• Carry Out Realistic Cybersecurity Drills

Because cybersecurity is not most employees’ typical work responsibility, it is essential to evaluate their knowledge to determine if they have acclimated to company cybersecurity standards. Create a bogus phishing attempt with your IT team to observe how your workers react. It can help predict whether they will be able to withstand the assault or if they will fail to detect the bogus email and leak critical information from your business. It will also determine if the training you have done to improve your defenses is successful.

If you want to take your test to the next level, consider hiring a third party to assess the company’s and your employees’ readiness. Conducting cybersecurity exercises identifies your company’s weakest link and enables you to fine-tune some of your ongoing cybersecurity strategies.

• Protect Critical Data at All Cost

Invest in technologies that minimize data loss, check third-party and fourth-party vendor risk, and regularly check for data exposure and leaked credentials. If left unchecked, information leaks may enable hackers to access corporate networks and breach critical resources. It is critical to building a data leak detection system that can also monitor breaches across the third-party network. Compromised third parties cause almost 60% of data breaches; hence, one may prevent the bulk of data breach events by preventing vendor data leaks.

Final Thoughts

Businesses must not doubt why cybersecurity is essential. Do wait until a cyberattack has been launched to take any preventive steps. It may not be simple at first, and it may require extra effort from the rest of the team, but being able to dodge away from the headache brought upon by cyberattack will make it valuable.

Improve your company’s cybersecurity by collaborating with Technical Paradigm’s award-winning team of cybersecurity specialists! Complete your cybersecurity staff requirements by looking into our other services, such as general security consulting, cybersecurity risk training, and even network security following an attack. Get in touch with us now to learn more!