5 Ways to Improve Your Business’ Online Security

The online world is becoming an increasingly dangerous place to be when it comes to scams, hackers and viruses, especially for businesses that aren’t clued up on how to protect themselves, their employees and their data from being accessed. 

There are several factors and methods that businesses should be using in 2021 to make sure that your and your client’s private data and information doesn’t fall into the hands of the wrong people. Especially more recently as the majority of office workers are working from home or remotely using their own IT systems and internet connections, hackers and scammers have hugely increased opportunity to try and breach your systems and steal information. 

Antivirus Software

First things first, make sure any work-related devices used by employees have strong antivirus software installed and setup correctly. You will need to keep on top of your licenses to ensure that everyone’s devices are kept secure and your accounts don’t run out leaving you unprotected. 

If you’re a business that has recently been setup or are looking for a new IT system to manage the security of your employees while working from home, you may want to consider working with a professional IT support company. Custard Technical Services offer a wide range of IT support services including network security, back and disaster recovery should anything go wrong and even have packages available to help businesses facilitate and manage employees working from home.  

Complex passwords

This step might go without saying but make sure your passwords are 100% unique for every platform or system you are setting them up on. Many of us are guilty of using the same passwords for everything out of ease to be able to remember all our logins but for a business this can be detrimental to the security of yours and your client’s personal and payment information. When setting up passwords, make them unique, complex and advise all employees to never save passwords to their device. 

On top of this, instead of writing passwords down or storing them in the cloud at risk of hackers, you can use a dedicated password management system for extra protection where employees must use two-factor authentication to login and access any passwords related to your company. 

Two-factor authentication

Password protection alone is no longer sufficient for keeping your private information secure, hence our smartphones now use face detection, fingerprints and screen pattens to allow us access. Two-factor authentication can help businesses to add an extra level of security. Usually, two-factor authentication involves having a password in place, which then sends a unique code to your email or phone for another step of security. It prevents hackers and scammers that are able to find out or guess your passwords from getting in without access to the code and can get brands out of some seriously sticky situations! 

VPNs

If your business works with important and private data day-to-day and isn’t using VPNs while your employees work from home, you should get this setup as soon as you can. VPNs are Virtual Private Networks, which, once someone is connected, provide an encrypted internet connection completely hidden from those on other networks. VPNs protect your employees and clients from scammers and hackers as all the information is transported to a server via a fully secure connection – you can think of it is a secret tunnel for your team. 

Be smart to scams

Last but not least, make sure you and your team are being smart online. During the pandemic, tons of new, complex and highly believable scams have come into play which can cost your employees and your business all your money if fallen for. Take the time to train your team about how to use the internet securely and safely and educate them on the types of scammers, hackers and malware to be on the lookout for.