In the internet age we know that criminals attack in different ways. In fact, cyberattacks are a way of attacking companies and individuals to steal economic information, their clients, or their projects. Losses in companies are important and affect both their reputation and their financial and legal status. Is it possible to defend against these attacks?
Impact on the company
The impact of a cyber-attack is serious damage to companies. Consumer confidence and loss of position against competitors, as well as a bad reputation are damages that cost a lot to repair. It mainly affects companies in three aspects:
- From an economic point of view, these cyber-attacks focus on the theft of the company’s financial information, corporate data, money, and bank data, and even paralyzing commercial transactions that prevent the signing of projects or the closing of contracts. Data loss is a serious problem for a company. In addition, restoring the initial situation to start again as if the attack had not occurred also costs a lot of money.
- From the point of view of reputation, cyberattacks damage the relationship with customers and the trust they have in the business, but also the relationship with collaborators, suppliers, and potential customers. Restoring trust is very difficult, and it is best to never lose it.
- Legally, a cyber-attack can make a company commit a legal crime. The theft of personal data, both of customers and users and suppliers directly affects the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and can put the company in a legal problem.
How to prevent
As you read this article, hackers will be inventing new ways to attack your business, your company, or just your computer. It is not worth waiting for them to attack you, you must prevent any attack attempt.
The first thing is to detect the vulnerabilities that exist in our network, computer system, tablets, smartphones, servers, or devices. Knowing where we are failing from a security point of view is essential, we must ask ourselves if we are not opening the door to a cybercriminal by not protecting ourselves adequately.
There are several aspects that every company and individual must be clear about when it comes to protecting themselves. In the same way that we don’t leave our wallet with money in the middle of the street and leave, there are things that should never be done in the technological age.
Inadequate passwords
Did you know that approximately 80% of cyber-attacks happen due to the use of weak passwords? Many users reuse the same password repeatedly, in different online services, so that each time they register on a platform, website or e-commerce they do so using a single password, they do this simply for convenience so as not to have to remember each password, but it is contradictory to the fact that it is just that, a password.
Hackers know this, and that is why an attack on a large website can reveal our password on many more websites, and we can be victims of a cybercriminal.
If this applies to users or employees of a company, the risk faced by the company is enormous, even putting the integrity of the company at risk if adequate protection solutions are not available. How do you protect yourself?
- Use a unique password for each account.
- Create a password that contains uppercase, lowercase, numbers, and symbols.
- Use a password manager that allows you to create random and secure passwords.
Inform all company employees of the importance of following these guidelines so that no one puts company confidentiality at risk.
Everything is at risk, from smart devices like phones, tablets, laptops, desktops, servers, databases, external storage drives, servers and virtual machines, operating systems, etc.
Avoid Malware and Phishing
Of course, having a good antivirus (early launch anti malware) or firewall is the first barrier to have, but sometimes it is not enough because people make mistakes that reveal access to their computer.
Opening an email that offers us a web address to visit can sometimes be a mistake. That innocent clicks to visit a link can take us to a false website where they ask us to insert confidential information such as usernames and passwords to steal the information, it can even install applications that monitor keystrokes.
This type of attack is not isolated, and even large companies have suffered its consequences. Access through an Android device is usually the most frequent way, but we must not neglect ourselves in any case.
It is always advisable to have the latest version of the software, browser, and operating system, and of course have the security patches installed.
And never fall into weaknesses such as going to a suspicious link or giving personal information on the wrong website.
Ransomware and Social Engineering
Blocking a computer, a smartphone or even a company server and demanding a ransom for unlocking it is known as a Ransomware attack and this extortion affects large private companies and small businesses every year. No one is free from his attack.
Social engineering is also in fashion lately, and it is that scammers pretend to be an employee of a company, or even the CEO of the same, sending us an email asking us to reset our password, a fact for which we must inform the current password, and there they are already able to access our data, or what is worse, the company network, customer databases, our bank details, etc. Yes, it really sounds scary, but we can be cautious and protect ourselves.
The best defense in these cases is to have a reliable and well-made backup, updated and with the assurance that a restoration can be carried out completely, efficiently and in a short time.
Only this allows that if a cyberattack is suffered, everything can be restored and continue as if nothing had happened, without losing action time or business time, continuing with transactions and daily work. Of course, with the lesson learned that you must be more effective in protection.
Remember that a cyberattack often causes the closure of the company in the medium term, since there are many cases in which it is not capable of recovering and restoring itself to continue with its activity, nor of recovering those customers who are terrified due to lack of trust. and whose data has been compromised.
And how to make the proper backup?
Without a doubt, it uses reliable software, such as Acronis Backup, which allows you to make backup copies in the cloud and have another backup copy on another device so that this data deduplication does not lead to loss of information.
It is important to make backups regularly. Each company or individual has its own needs, and there are those who must schedule them so that they are carried out daily, as well as those who can maintain a backup copy per month. Each situation is, and the frequency of backup copies must be adjusted to the specific case.
Measures to consider
Data encryption is a method that allows information to be protected, so that, even if an attack by a cybercriminal is suffered, he cannot have access to said information because an unknown algorithm oversees encrypting the information and data, and not it can be decrypted if you don’t have the key for it.
Develop a disaster response plan so you know what to do in the worst case. This may seem like a waste of time and money for some businessmen, but the truth is that the lack of investment in this aspect is what ultimately leads to disaster for companies that do not overcome this attack.
Detecting vulnerabilities and having an established plan that must be known by all those involved in the event of an attack is positive and improves productivity and company objectives.
Plan the storage of your data in the cloud, manage the schedule of backups and restoration of data. Identify what data is necessary to not stop your business, do not think only about financial data, but also about networks, servers, operating systems, information from external devices.
Remove malware and ransomware, avoid phishing, don’t fall for third-party scams, or give away your data cheerfully, and fight to avoid being targeted by these threats.
Remember that if you must be in the situation of restoring your systems, servers, and data you must be more effective in the future so as not to be compromised again.
The education of employees and individuals on cybersecurity issues is essential to avoid suffering a cyber-attack or sabotage, so have common sense when using a computer, reading emails, visiting websites, and having backup copies. of data, files and operating systems is key to being protected and not suffering consequences.
Reducing the possibilities is in your hands, so don’t leave it for later, invest in protection and security and keep your data and information in a safe place.
