CYBER SECURITY BEST PRACTICE #1 FOR YOUR BUSINESS

The fundamental cyber security best practice is to cultivate a cyber smart culture within your business and among your people.

Technology is booming everywhere. Almost hourly, we design new and better time saving, business building and customer serving apps and devices to let us act and communicate anywhere and everywhere, at any time.

And it’s all good until the bad guys arrive.

The Bad Guys

Cyber Criminals – seek financial gain through fraud and identity theft.

Competitors, foreign & domestic – seek economic advantage.

Hackers – enjoy disrupting computer systems for whatever reason, including being paid to do so by criminals, competitors and other bad guys.

Hacktivists – attack businesses for political or ideological motives.

Employees

  • seeking revenge
  • making an error
  • getting scammed by a bad guy

Employees making an error or getting scammed may not be the “bad guy”, but these insider breaches account for 19%1 of data leakage and can only be prevented by a cyber smart culture.

A cyber smart culture is one that continually reminds itself of the dangers that exist and the safety procedures to deploy. The cyber world is continually changing and constant vigilance and updating is necessary.

1 based on the 2015 Cost of Data Breach Study by the Ponemon Institute

Cyber Smart People

The fundamental cyber security best practice is cultivating cyber smart employees, people who know about cyber issues and events like . . .

Data In Transit & At Rest

Cyber Risk Awareness & Management

Incident Reporting and Reacting

User access

Media Controls

Software & Hardware Security

Malware Protection

Network Security

We need not be experts but in today’s business world where we rely more and more on computers and electronic devices, we need to be aware of the threats and the every-day safeguards we humans can and should take to protect data.

And the fundamental best practice regarding cyber security is to continually communicate and educate ourselves and our people about the bad guys, the threats and preventive measures.

Some Cyber Security Resources

There are resources that provide free information and insights:

National Cyber Security Alliance

https://staysafeonline.org/business-safe-online/train-your-employees

The Federal Trade Commission

https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center

Symantec Corporation

https://www.symantec.com/small-business

TrendMicro Company

https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/business.html

US Computer Emergency Readiness Team

https://www.us-cert.gov/

Test Your Knowledge of Cyber Security

A large issue in the world of cyber safety is that most of us do not know what we do not know. As a starter, check out these training modules at Wombat Security. What do you know and need to know?

https://www.wombatsecurity.com/about/news/reduce-cyber-security-risks-employee-training

Dale Brodsky, Founder & Owner of Fundus Photo — provides a broad range of ophthalmic imaging equipment and Fundus Photo’s “NewVision Ophthalmic Imaging Suite”, software designed specifically for ophthalmic imaging and image management.