Cybercrime has been a serious issue for businesses for many years. However, for some reasons many thought that the main target of these criminals was always big organizations and companies with a global presence. Perhaps this was because more damage could be done or because they had more money for those committing this crime for financial reasons.
The truth is that cybercriminals often prefer to target smaller businesses over larger ones. Why? Well, they realize that that smaller businesses don’t have the same sort of money to invest in cyber-security products as larger ones. In addition, smaller businesses are less likely to be able to provide training to employees with regards to identifying and tackling cybercrime.
Why smaller businesses must take precautions
The truth is that cybercrime is just as much a threat to small businesses as larger ones, if not more so. Easier access and lack of preventative measures means that cybercriminals will have a far easier time targeting the average small business rather than a larger one. This means that smaller businesses have to be even more careful and take precautions in order to protect themselves against the damage that cybercrime can cause.
So, what sorts of steps can you take as a smaller business in order to protect your systems and company from falling victim to cybercrime? Well, here are some of the key things you need to do:
· Assessment of security: If you have little or no security in place at the moment, get an assessment done. If you have IT staff, they could do this for you or you can get specialists in. They can look at your systems and determine what level and type of security you need in order to benefit from proper protection against cybercrime.
· Proper training; It has been proven that cybercriminals will often target lower lever staff. You therefore need to ensure that all employees have some level of training when it comes to how to recognize cybercrime and what they should/should not do. Something as simple as an innocent-looking email could be a phishing scam but without training, your employees will have no idea about this.
· Make sure you backup: If you do not use the cloud for your business data storage, you need to ensure that you have some sort of backup system in place. You may have software that does it for you or you may do manual backups. Whatever option you go with, make sure that these backups are done regularly or you could end up losing a huge amount of data as the result of cybercriminal activity.
It is important for smaller businesses not to get complacent and think that they are not at risk. Measures have to be put into place sooner rather than later, as otherwise it could be too late. The effects of this type of criminal activity can be devastating on a business, so it is definitely advisable to try and prevent it from happening in the first place.
