If you are in business, then you have no choice but to adopt new technology to stay competitive in the market. The problem is that you also ought to keep an eye on your business security as you improve your tech stack. Yes, a data breach in your company has the potential to damage your relationship with employees, customers, and also vendors. It could even kill your business!
Now, let us look at some simple data protection tips you can use to secure your business.
Data protection tips against cybercrime
Train your employees on cybersecurity
You cannot secure data without having employees on your side. Well, the first step to bring employees on your side is by creating a cybersecurity policy for your business. It should contain cyber security best practices that you expect employees to follow. Also, include procedures for keeping the employees, vendors, and customer information safe. In addition to that, your cybersecurity policy should contain protocols that employees must follow in case there is a suspicion of a data breach.
Enlighten your employees on the need to keep personal details secret. They should not share such information as to their identification numbers, passwords, or any sensitive information through emails or any porous online platform. This will significantly reduce the risk of a data breach.
Tip:
- Educate employees on common types of cyberattacks targeted at businesses such as phishing and the likes.
Keep business and personal accounts separate
As a start-up owner, it is advisable to have separate emails for your business, your personal use, and your bank. This is crucial in reducing data breach risk. For example, if a hacker happens to access your email, it will be harder for them to reach your business website or bank details as they are not interlinked.
It is also imperative to advise your employees to create separate email accounts other than using corporate emails for their private conversations. This will minimize the risks of data loss to unauthorized parties. As a result, your customer data and that of your business will be secure from a data breach.
Safeguard your business website with SSL certificate
Before submitting their complex data such as passwords and emails, your customers will need to be sure that your website is secure. Research has found that customers are aware of the security threats of transacting online. Therefore, to secure your brand and the consumer, you will need to safeguard your website from attacks. One of the easiest ways to do it is to use a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate.
The SSL certificate encrypts the information that is sent to the server from the user browser. It authenticates the identity of the site and provides secure communication between a website and a browser. An SSL will secure data transfer, log in details, credit card transactions, and the likes. It is quite easy to use for example; you can acquire a cheap SSL wildcard certificate and install it on your site in case if the site is running on several subdomains. What a wildcard means is that you can use it to secure your business website domain and the subdomains fall under it.
The bottom line is that using an SSL certificate from Cheapsslshop.com to encrypt data on your website will not only secure data but it will help build customer trust, improve SEO rankings, thus increasing conversion rates.
Beware of password security
Passwords are a layer of authentication in your business. So, having a strong password means that it is harder for hackers to access your information. That is why you should create and enforce password policies in which all your team members are required to create strong passwords. The recommended strong password should be about eight characters long, with both letters and numbers.
Also, the team should change the passwords regularly, after nearly every two months. This significantly reduces the chances of hacking, and therefore, averts cases of a possible data breach. This article explains more about the password security measures you should implement in your business.
Secure your company tech infrastructure
You will need to secure your company IT infrastructure starting from your Wi-Fi. Yes, you should ensure your Wi-Fi so that only your employees can access it. You can also make sure that the password is only known to you to avoid interference internally, as this could affect your business in the long run.
If you decide to offer Wi-Fi to your customers, you can make sure to install a separate network for them. Hence, you will prevent unauthorized people from joining the business Wi-Fi and accessing your business files illegally.
There are other key ways to secure your IT infrastructure, including using software and hardware firewalls, using proper Antivirus tools, using up to date software, etc.
Enforce restrictive data permissions
Most data breaches are usually not sophisticated attacks through backdoors. Often, they occur through the front door to employee accounts that are related to the business. That is why you should be very careful when determining who to permit to access various sets of data within your business. You should continuously ensure that your employees only have access to the vital information that forms part of their jobs. As a result, the restrictive data permissions will prevent the types of data breaches from happening.
Backup your data
While the prevention of possible cybersecurity attacks is a great move, it is crucial to always prepare for any eventuality in terms of data risks. As such, you should always ensure you backup your critical data to reduce the impact of a breach. You can make good use of cloud storage and local backups using storage drives, LAN storage, USB drives, etc.
Wrap up
Data risks are nothing new in business, and they are bound to get even worse with time. They can hurt or even kill your business. So, as a business owner, you should put strict measures in place to ensure that every bit of your company data is secure. You have to stay safe or risk losing it all!