Tip of the Week: Best Practices to Protect Your Business

There are many different varieties of cybercrime that businesses need to be vigilant about. However, most of these varieties can largely be avoided through a few basic practices and behaviors. Here, we’re giving you a few tips to help you prevent attacks from successfully influencing your business, so make sure you share them with your entire team, as well.

1. Reconsider What You Click On

It’s almost automatic for many users to see a link on a website, in their email, and elsewhere. This is something that hackers are very aware of, and often use to their advantage.

Kind of like we just did there (if you clicked on that link).

See how easy it is to fool someone this way? To help avoid this being used to undermine your security, build up the habit of hovering your cursor over a link before clicking on it. This will display the actual destination of a link somewhere on your screen, which you should always check so you will know that it is legitimate. 

2. Use Access Controls

While this may be obvious, you need to make sure that someone who isn’t allowed access to your business’ files or location isn’t able to access them. This means that you need to have all the suggested data security measures and practices in place to protect against the unauthorized access of any of your files, including any hard copies. Keep your physical data locked up, and protect all data with multiple layers of authentication requirements.

3. Keep an Eye Out for Scammers

While we’ve already covered this in part with tip number one, there are other ways to catch attempted cybercrimes that are often used in conjunction with misleading links. Cybercriminals use various methods, referred to as “phishing”, to manipulate their targets into behaving the way the attacker wants. Sometimes it is by using a falsified link, sometimes through scare tactics, and often through a combination of the two. Some phishing attacks are researched extensively to be as effective as possible against a certain target, while others are broader and more generic and meant to catch as many people as possible with minimal work. Make sure your team is informed of these attacks and knows to double-check requests through a different communication method if there is any doubt at all. When in doubt? Pick up the phone and call the sender.

4. Two-Ply Protections

Make sure that you are layering your defenses against cyberthreats. Maintain an updated antivirus solution and utilize a virtual private network when accessing the Internet and activate all onboard protections that your devices offer and use all of the assorted solutions and practices that are available for you to leverage. To discourage cybercrime on a comprehensive scale, you need to take thorough actions and fill in all the small holes that could potentially exist in your security.

Washington Works can help with all of this, and more. For answers to any technology questions you may have, or direct assistance in implementing any of this, reach out to us at 301-571-5040.