If you need awareness training that's quick and easy for your small business, check out our training. Quick Start Bundle for Small Businesses. Small businesses can access his 10-week training on 5 different fundamental topics for up to 25 employees.
2) Software
There are several important pieces of software that every business should use. The best part about software is that it usually only needs to be installed once and can be used for a long time. It's well worth the initial investment and will save you money later when you no longer have to fix problems caused by security breaches.
antivirus software
Antivirus software acts as part of your security team by preventing, scanning, detecting, and removing viruses from your computer. As mentioned earlier, antivirus software is usually a one-time download but can be used indefinitely. Once downloaded to all your employees' computers, you can set it to run regularly. This means regularly checking all computers for viruses that have penetrated beyond the employee's knowledge.
You probably don't have a large enough team to check all your desktops regularly, so let this software do it for you.
firewall software
Install firewall software (There are some great free ones) protect your network from external intruders. This is also a one-time installation, and once installed, it monitors your network and controls all traffic sent and received. This is an essential investment for any business.
Many small businesses also choose to work remotely to avoid workspace costs. If this is the route you decide on, make sure that any remote employee networks also have appropriate firewalls in place.
3) Data protection
As a small business, it's tempting to store everything in Google Drive. However, he only needs to guess your Google password once and the cyber crook will have instant access to all your data. In other scenarios, employees within your company may gain access to sensitive information and leak it, either intentionally or accidentally.
Consider what data needs to be most protected (financial information, customer and employee SINs, passwords, etc.) and make sure it's at the top of your security list. Consider keeping this data off-network and on hardware. It also limits access to data that employees don't need, reducing the possibility of internal or external leaks.
When reorganizing your data, we recommend that you upload all your data to your hard drive. This way, if your business experiences a breach, you won't have to frantically try to get your data back.
Free and easy security booster
There are other quick, free, and easy security hardening tools that businesses can use to improve their security programs.
- Casual security conversation: Organic security conversations are the biggest signal of a healthy security culture. To increase these conversations, create a Slack #security channel to share security news articles and answer questions. If your team isn't using Slack, try sharing news articles in a weekly roundtable. Incorporating security into daily activities increases security by making employees more aware of vulnerabilities and making attacks easier to spot.
- Password and MFA: Many cybersecurity incidents are not the result of a “break-in” but a simple “login.” Repeatedly using weak passwords is the easiest way for cybercriminals to break into your account. Require strong passwords for all employees and support those strong passwords with her MFA. These two cost nothing. easy password hint It takes almost no time.
- Show your leadership: Your leadership team will likely be small (maybe just one person), but having them on board can replace a lot of the effort of your security marketing team. Use your communication strategy to reach out to your team and use your leadership to get your message across, rather than selling them on the importance of security. If they value the importance of security, everyone else will follow suit.
- Don't reinvent the wheel. Consider what already exists within your organization. What communication channels does your team use? What other training do they have? Save time and money by leveraging these instead of starting everything from scratch Maybe you can. For example, if your team already meets in person every year to review your KPIs, consider holding a quick social engineering workshop and leveraging your rental space. If your team already uses Slack to communicate, use some of the Slack ideas discussed throughout this article.
- Keep your system up to date. Finally, it's important to keep all systems up to date. Consider setting up a monthly “update day” to remind all employees to take the time to update all systems.
Even small businesses can run a successful security program, even if they have limited resources. Knowing the basics of security awareness, software, and data protection will get you off to a great start. #security Strengthen your foundation with free and easy boosters like Slack channels and MFA. This will help you sleep better at night knowing that not only is your data safe, but your business is protected.
