The Biggest Cybersecurity Problems Small Businesses Have in 2021

Data breaches have become all too common for small businesses over the past several years and when it seems like there is a solution to one problem, something even worse pops up. Part of a comprehensive risk management strategy is identifying problems and doing what you can to keep them from affecting your business. Let’s take a look at the major cybersecurity threats small businesses are facing in 2021 and what you can do to keep them from hurting your business.

Phishing

For the small business, phishing makes up a large percentage of problematic cybersecurity situations. Phishing is more of a scam than a hack, but regardless of how you view it, it is the most dangerous problem businesses have to face when considering cybercrime. A phishing attack can come on any communications medium (including social media) and it only has to work one time for it to become problematic for your business. 

It works like this: A member of your staff, working at their regular breakneck pace, accidentally clicks on an attachment in an email that they think of as something to do with their jobs. Turns out, the email was spoofed and the attachment just deployed malware on your network. This can be trojans, viruses, or something as terrible as ransomware. 

Phishing is not only the most prevalent form of cyberscam, it is also extremely hard to combat. The hackers that use it are getting more sophisticated, and if your business isn’t evolving your strategies to keep up, you have a pretty good chance of being a victim. You need to have a comprehensive training system in place to tell your team about the dangers of phishing and how to spot possible phishing attempts. 

Poor Password Hygiene

Like passing that guy at the gym that always smells like B.O., it’s a sour situation when poor password hygiene is the reason for a data breach or a malware infection. Like phishing strategies, today’s hackers have very sophisticated strategies to guess people’s passwords. Not only that, social engineering can expose poorly made or duplicated passwords pretty easily. 

Passwords are used by almost every organization online and it is important that your employees select passwords that aren’t obvious and aren’t duplicates from other accounts. It is also important that your organization understands how to keep their data safe through the use of password best practices, such as not having employees constantly change their passwords, as they have a tendency to make them simple to remember or they don’t change them much from previous passwords.

Holes in Software

Like most other products, software titles have a support staff attached to them. These teams include development professionals whose job is to keep it secure. These patches are rolled out pretty regularly. If you don’t patch your software, you could have major holes that can be exploited. These vulnerabilities are regularly taken advantage of and are effectively open doors for hackers to get into your network.

The best way to keep these vulnerabilities from appearing is to regularly patch your software with the updates as they come out. Doing so will close the proverbial doors to your network and data and keep your digital resources safe. 

If your business would like to talk to one of our IT experts about getting the cybersecurity protection you need, or if you would learn more about which strategies work the best to keep your business’ network and infrastructure free from threats, give Washington Works a call today at 301-571-5040.