With the rise of malicious attack methods, owners need to be aware of the cost of cyber attacks to small businesses. The growth of cybercrime will cost the global economy more than $2 trillion by 2019, according to the Better Business Bureau’s 2017 State of Cybersecurity Among Small Businesses in North America report. Hackers have adopted a combination of complex and simple ways to bypass your security protocol to access your data. Spam emails and Adware are common methods used to gather information about a user’s computer without their knowledge. The risk of an employee clicking and downloading malicious content is very significant.
What Do You Stand To Lose?
Whenever a business is hit with a cyber attack, the first gut wrenching thought is the cost associated with it. However, these breaches can affect business operations, customer loyalty and company reputation as well. Some businesses were forced to either close or start all over again from scratch because of the significant data loss.
Potential Losses from Cyber Attacks
- A cyber attack will lead to loss of customers based on the fact that they don’t trust your business to safely house their information.
- A data breach will more than likely reduce the number of business opportunities available to your business.
- A significant loss associated with cyber attacks will be a drop in revenue. Your business operations could be shut down for some time and it could take even longer to get everything back up again.
- Your company’s reputation and brand will suffer a hit. Depending on the scale of the attack, it could be a PR nightmare.
Guidelines to Protect Your Business
- Your employees are your first line of defense. Make sure they are educated on cyber security best practices. They should be aware of the company security policy and the importance of adhering to it. Also, there should be consequences for not following the policy.
- Emails from within or outside the organization should be reviewed. Those with unusual attachments or links should be checked by IT staff prior to being opened.
- Security systems such as firewalls, antivirus software and intrusion detection devices should be set up in the network.
- Develop a cyber security policy for your business and share it with all employees.
- Test your security protocol and systems continuously to ensure they are meeting all requirements.
- Create a disaster recovery system that allows you to backup and restore your data as soon as possible.
Gensys Technology is here to help you understand the cost of cyber attacks to your small business. Our cyber security experts will help you develop and institute a security policy to keep your company data secure. Contact one of our analysts today for a discussion.
