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Small companies are attractive targets for cybercriminals because they don’t have the resources to combat it like the more prominent companies. Or they’re hoping that they don’t. Has a data breach compromised your company? Consider bringing in a digital forensics investigator that can root out any security issues they find when examining your setup. They’re invaluable resources for data recovery, digital forensics analysis, expert witness testimony, and much more.

Keeping your customers’ data protected is essential not only for their protection but for your business. We live in a digital era where even companies like Facebook and Instagram are vulnerable to cyber-attacks and hackers. Encourage your employees to create complex passwords, run virus and malware scans daily on work computers and destroy all data before disposing of it. Every and any company, no matter how big or small, can be susceptible to cyberattacks.

Here are some actionable, practical steps you can take to keep your customers’ information more secure today.

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According to recent reports, cyberattacks are occurring every 39 seconds in the US. Sounds impressive, doesn’t it? What’s more, one attack can harm millions of people. For example, when Atlanta was attacked using ransomware called SamSam, the city was offline for five days, which halted several significant citywide operations. As a result, the amount of recovery cost reached $17 million.

Cyberattacks can also happen on a global scale with hackers breaching big government organizations. The National Cyber Security Center warns everyone that Russia is exploiting network infrastructure devices to lay the groundwork for future attacks on infrastructure like power stations and energy grids.

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According to the Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy, there are 30.2 million small businesses in the United States, making up 99.9% of all businesses in the country. Due to such a sizeable representative percentage, any discussion about cybersecurity statistics should focus on small businesses.

While the SBA defines small businesses as any business with less than 500 employees, most have far fewer, making them soft targets for cybercriminals. For small businesses, fewer resources mean they should approach cybersecurity in a much different way to larger enterprises, using more innovative and more agile protection methods. 

Small Businesses Cybersecurity Plan

A small business cybersecurity plan outlines the steps and measures to secure a business from attacks like malware, phishing, and ransomware. While most small businesses may not see the need to document such a plan, it is critical to ensure compliance across the company. 

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2020 has initiated a sea change into the way organisations of all shapes and sizes approaches business. The new normal is here to stay for a while even after the pandemic subsides and remote and anywhere operations will remain the new norm for companies across the world. To meet the new needs of remote consumers and clients, companies have tried their very best to leverage technological assets for seamless delivery of products and services.

However, security has remained a concern as data breaches have raised dramatically with 36 billion records exposed just in the first half of 2020. If there is a New Year’s resolution going forward for businesses, it should one of building resilience and a secure environment for our partners, customers, employees and the extended network. Keeping and building on their trust has never been more important than at this particular juncture in history.

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Understanding is the first step to combating Phishing: Types, Methodology & Prevention Tips 

According to the 2019 Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR) by Verizon, phishing is the leading cause of data breaches. The data also shows us that phishing is also widely utilized for cyber espionage with more than three-quarters of all known incidents involving phishing.

The statistics are also resonated by IBM’s findings in the 2019 Cost of a Data Breach report, where fifty-one per cent of incidents in all surveyed organizations involved malicious attacks with “malware infections, criminal insiders, phishing/social engineering and SQL injection.” 

Clearly, phishing continues to dominate as the one of the most persistent and highly effective tools of cyber-attacks. In this article, we will take an in-depth look at what phishing is, types of phishing and how to protect your business from these types of attacks.

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Getting a cybersecurity MA degree is not easy, and it might cost you thousands of dollars. Will the results be worth the money and effort? Let’s start by saying that there’s no lack of job ads in this sector. The salaries are more than decent, and the growth potential is huge.

If you’re a student thinking about continuing your education in an IT niche, you might be wondering: is a cyber security degree a good investment? Short answer: YES. As for the more elaborate answer, let’s discuss why you should study cyber security in 2021.

Are you at a crossroads when deciding on your educational path? It’s understandable. You don’t want to choose a degree that pushes you to seek Spanish homework help or delegate other assignments that don’t interest you. You want to study a promising field that will spark joy in you and provide lucrative opportunities.

By 2023, the size of the global cybersecurity market is predicted to grow to $248.26 billion. The industry is expected to grow at a consistent pace. You know what that means: more open positions, better salaries, and improved perspectives for career growth.

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What happens when your co-passengers are engrossed in their mobiles/ PDAs and the driver feels drowsy at the wheel? Well, he can’t monitor the road for safe driving, that’s for sure. Unfortunately, the threats that cybersecurity experts have to deal with on a daily basis are a bit less obvious than hulking frames of glass and metal hurtling your way. And yet, as the business’ first line of defence against potential threats, they are expected to be on alert 24*7 year in and year out.

In a recent study, Accenture reported that nearly 68% of business leaders feel on edge about rapidly ramping cybersecurity risks. The view is amplified by RiskBased who report an estimated 36 billion data records breached just in the first half of 2020. With remote operations and anywhere operations becoming the norm in the aftermath of the pandemic, a rise in digital breaches was expected. But even so, the scale and number of attacks in 2020 has been unnerving. Moreover, with 5G connectivity enabling faster speeds and bandwidth of connected devices; it also has the untoward effect of making cyber-attacks faster and more efficient. And yet, Varonis reports that only 5% of companies have adequate security structures in place to protect business information in folders.

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2020 has been a year of learning for businesses on many levels. From enabling global remote practically overnight to switching to cloud-based applications and infrastructure – the list of learnings has been long. But none have managed to make quite a dent as much as the dramatic rise in malicious attacks on cloud and on-site networks. If anything, 2020 has been the year of the pandemic as well as large-scale, well-publicized security breaches.

According to RiskBased, just the first half of 2020 saw nearly 36 billion records exposed in data breaches. Verizon showed that 45% of breaches involved hacking, 17% were malware-based and 22% were phishing attacks. Suffice to say that the need for comprehensive cybersecurity planning and management has never been quite this palpable.

The financial cost of data breaches is only the tip of the iceberg with IBM estimating the average cost to be around $3.86 million in 2020 with an average lifecycle of around 280 days from identification to containment. Even a minor breach can leave businesses with exposed sensitive information that can leave users vulnerable to identity theft, financial damage, ruin the reputation of your business and leave you liable for compliance violations. Companies like IT Support Vermont can help businesses locally to adjust to the quickly changing cyber-attack landscape to try and adapt their technologies, processes, and policies.

Cybersecurity threats are only expected to evolve and grow increasingly difficult to identify and eliminate. So, without further ado…,

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The global cloud computing market is set to reach $623.3 billion by 2023. The cloud is the ultimate tool in building highly scalable and flexible networks that can be set up in a flash. This offers a great opportunity for businesses looking to avoid high sunk costs in setting up infrastructure or, in phasing out legacy infrastructure components. Businesses of all shapes and sizes have realized the potential of cloud computing and have either already moved the whole or part of their operations to the cloud already or are in the process of migrating.

But the cloud is a shared resource and identity management, privacy and access control will always remain areas of concern for cloud-based businesses. Managing security for vulnerabilities throughout your operations network has become a top concern for businesses, especially in the wake of COVID-19, remote work and anywhere operations. As more and more people become dependent on the web for their daily work without being physically located in the protective womb of a physical business network, vulnerabilities have risen concomitantly with highly complex attacks, such as, DDoS (distributed denial of service) and Level 7 (application layer) attacks.

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UK’s Digital Strategy – Future Model or Another Thought Piece?

First announced in 2015, the United Kingdom (UK) finally published its Digital Strategy that went into effect on March 1, 2017.  Per the government’s website, the goal of this document is to provide a blueprint how the UK will build on its success to date in developing a world-leading digital economy that works for the greater good.  This is particularly important given that the UK is a global capital for financial technology, which generated £6.6bn of revenue in 2015.

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