Washington Works Blog

January 28th marks Data Privacy Day, a day intended to raise awareness of the importance of data privacy and educate users and business owners of its benefits. Spearheaded by the National Cyber Security Alliance, there are plenty of lessons the NCSA has to share with businesses as this day puts their, and their clients’, privacy in the spotlight.

If your organization is fortunate enough to have an internal IT department, it’s likely that they are managing a complex infrastructure on top of being understaffed and overworked. We're not knocking your business or anything; it’s just the nature of the work and the reality of SMBs (trust us, we’d know). We can make managing your technology significantly easier and less of a pressure on your IT workers.

No matter what type of business you run or the services you provide to the community, chances are you must adhere to at least some compliance laws and regulatory requirements dictated by state or federal governments. Today, we want to make it abundantly clear that you must protect your business’ data to avoid inadvertently becoming subject to the massive fines associated with these laws.

Our digital footprint is extensive and vulnerable, from personal information to financial details. While many may believe they are impervious to data theft, the stark reality is that no one is truly immune. Today, we will take a look at a couple of reasons why individuals, regardless of their experience with technology, are not exempt from data theft.

Digital monitoring is a bit of a contentious topic in business, but according to a survey from Gartner, it might not be as contentious of a topic as previously thought. In fact, employees are often in favor of digital monitoring under the appropriate circumstances, as long as it doesn’t get in the way of their jobs.

It probably isn’t a question you’ve put much thought to, but tell me: who do you think feels the greatest impact from card skimming schemes, where a payment card’s data is captured so a cybercriminal can make use of the card’s associated account? While it isn’t a good situation for anyone, some are impacted more than others.

It’s incredibly important to keep your personally identifiable information secure, but what exactly constitutes PII? Today we offer a definition and suggestions or strategies to help you keep your PII safe.

As time has passed, cybersecurity attacks have become another way some organizations and nations engage in warfare. You can argue that there is a war going on at all times in cyberspace while hackers—many of which are sponsored by government agencies—try to outdo security researchers at all turns. One such scenario sees customers in the United States and Israeli defense technology sectors becoming the target of “password spraying.”

Have you ever wondered what it takes to hire a hacker to perform a specific task? Thanks to the findings of Comparitech, we can get a look into the average pricings of various hacking services that can be found on the Dark Web. While we would never condone ever taking advantage of such services, it’s a fascinating look into the business of cybercrime, and one that can give you an idea of just how easy and accessible it is for hackers to make your life difficult.

The term “encryption” has found its way into the mainstream, appearing just about anywhere information security is brought up. Whether it is ransomware encrypting data or the encryption protecting your password security, it is a powerful tool that can be used for both good and evil. Let’s discuss the former and how you might use encryption in the workplace.

The world might still be suffering from a pandemic, but travel is slowly starting to pick up once again. When you feel safe and comfortable traveling again, it is of critical importance that you take steps to secure your technology while out of the office—especially your mobile devices. Here are some big ways that you can prioritize security while traveling.

Data privacy is a bit of a hot topic in today’s business environment, especially with high-profile hacks and ransomware attacks emerging and putting organizations at risk. In particular, the emerging concept of “privacy engineering” has a lot of businesses thinking about how they can secure their organization and future-proof their data privacy infrastructures.

Just in case you haven’t been paying attention, online privacy has been highlighted significantly in recent years—in no small part due to the sale of our profiles by the tech giants that provide today’s most (in)famous websites… including and especially Google. Having said this, it is also important to acknowledge that some of Google’s recent policy changes could suggest that this may change at some point.

If you are an avid reader of our blog, we are constantly saying how there are always a growing number of threats. This is true. Two-in-every-three business owners consider that their cybersecurity risks are increasing each year. The other third must not focus on them, and that is a problem. In fact, many business owners don’t give the proper respect to cyberthreats and many of those businesses pay the price. This is why every business should consider a security and compliance audit a mandatory part of their yearly IT assessment. 

While this time of year is always huge for online retail, there is likely to be a much larger number of people turning to the Internet for their holiday purchases than usual… and, it would seem, a larger number of people taking security into consideration as they do so. Let’s examine how consumers are taking their data into their own hands and what this means for your business.

Unfortunately, it is hard for the modern business to keep all of their data secure. There are just so many threats that most businesses leak data without even knowing it. There are things you can do, however. Today we will go through four considerations that can help you stay ahead of cybercriminals. 

Keeping your network and infrastructure free from threats is always a priority, but with so many people working remotely businesses have encountered problems doing so. In fact, hackers, known for their opportunism, have been ultra-opportunistic during this period and it is causing many headaches for network administrators. Let’s take a look at some statistics that are definitely concerning as we head into the fall, where many experts expect the virus to become more problematic. 

How concerned are you about your data privacy, as a consumer, particularly when you entrust it to another business? If you answered “very”, you aren’t alone… 87 percent of Americans consider their data privacy to be a human right. Having said that, most don’t pay near enough attention to their own security precautions. Let’s take a few moments and examine this trend.

While there is no question that security is important to any business, there is often a disconnect between this principle and any actual implementations that it reflects. Unfortunately, this can often leave a business vulnerable. To prevent this outcome, it is important that you follow a few best practices when it comes to fortifying your business against attack.

Wherever there is money, there are scammers. So it may not be a big surprise that scammers are out en masse trying to get between you and your federally mandated stimulus money.  It’s bad enough that we’ve already seen a couple of phishing scams using the COVID-19 pandemic that are designed to help hackers get into accounts they have no business in, now that these scammers know that people are getting cash, the scams are kicked up a notch.