In June, the US government itself issued ransomware guidance for businesses. In the recent past, Colonial Oil was hit by ransomware which caused a lot of the northeast of America to be without crude oil for a couple of weeks. This suddenly put immense pressure on the US infrastructure and panic among customers. You could see lines of vehicles outside gas stations as the rumor of a hack that shut down an oil station spread like wildfire. It causes the US president to make a statement in a press conference and for every business to look at their cybersecurity defenses in a new light. This is something you should be doing too.
The basics
Cybersecurity is so complex, which is why even experienced IT professionals are constantly having to sharpen their skills, learn new things and take courses to increase their knowledge. Here are some of the basics you need to know.
- Data encryption. This is vital for your servers. When you send and receive data, it should be encrypted so it cannot be read and or captured by any malware that is present in the system.
- Firewalls. These will be passworded walls, which do not allow anything to proceed unless the correct password has been supplied. This can be encrypted in messages that are sent or received, but this will be relevant to fix private communication channels.
- Internal dangers. Always remind employees to change their passwords regularly. At least once per month. So employees should have 12 password changes throughout the year. Protect your files from nonchalant access by only giving access to managers.
Sometimes the physical is better
For some things, the physical aspect of business is just better. For example, if you are sending and receiving contracts, you do not want them to be intercepted by hackers. Why? They will demand a ransom or they will share the contract with your competitors, the media or regulators. So use https://physicaladdress.com/ which can open and send your mail to you, in complete safety and security. They are a cloud-based service, with high security and an IT infrastructure that can be trusted. After you have got your mail, the team can destroy your mail so it cannot be stored or sent to someone else. Not to mention, they are completely unbiased professionals who cannot be influenced to send your mail to someone else for a fee.
Multi-factor authentication
Almost every business site needs to have multi-factor authentication. You’ve seen the tests that make sure you are not a robot. These should be the very least you do. Jigsaw puzzles or particular cognitive tests should be present so dangerous programs that try to hack your website are detected. Multi-factor authentication also means you ask visitors and employees to receive a code to their phone to proceed forward, perhaps share their location in the browser or even use an app to login first before getting access.
How can you improve your cybersecurity? You can implement the basics, improve them, do them perfectly. Invest in physical channels where you can send and receive information.
