7 Ways To Secure Data For Your Business
As society and technology progresses, more businesses start to ditch the paperwork and shift to the cyber age. With this new environment, stealing information activities such as illegal hacking and cyberattacks are more prevalent. They are also fairly easy if given the opportunity.
Thankfully, these illegal acts can be prevented by having proper security solutions installed in your business. Simple security methods such as installing anti-virus, firewall, and cloud-security software can protect your company’s data. But these simple methods do not apply to all businesses.
The bigger the business, the bigger is the value of your data and assets therefore big companies and organizations must come up with brilliant strategies and execute complex security protocol measures.
Context
Take the United States Department of Defense (DoD) Pentagon’s initiative for example. The Pentagon is the center of operation in dealing with worldwide command and control regarding defense issues that involve the United States. You can only imagine the value of data stored in the Pentagon as it could erase nations from the map.
Last 2016, the DoD launched the “Hack the Pentagon” bug bounty program and it engaged hundreds of ethical hackers around the globe to lawfully discover and disclose vulnerabilities on its assets. Surprisingly in just 6 HOURS after the launch, nearly 200 vulnerabilities have been discovered in the DoD’s networks.
This strategy uncovered flaws in the DoD’s network security and helped them rebuild a stronger defense against illegal hacking and cyberattacks.
However, if you own a food company, chances are you have no nuclear codes lying around your cloud storage. This means you might not need the high, complex security as the Pentagon has. But if you have a “secret formula” that other food companies are dying to know, then it’s best to say that you need to protect that formula the best you can. This is to prevent other people from knowing and replicating your recipe.
Protecting the data of your business also includes your customers’ and clients’ information. Therefore, it is all the more important to implement cybersecurity to prevent losing trust and authority, especially if you are in the service business sector.
The point is, having cybersecurity software along with good strategies can definitely help secure data for your business. Here are 7 ways you can secure your business’s data as a small or big business owner.
Encryption is Key
Encryption is one of, if not the best option, among many cybersecurity solutions you can install in your network systems against hackers. The encryption of your data acts as the muscle of your network systems whenever hackers successfully infiltrate your firewall defenses.
Having an encrypted database only allows the owner or the assigned employee to view readable information. Without the encryption key, the encrypted data will only come out as a bunch of random, unreadable line segments. Therefore even if the hacker managed to get data that is encrypted, they basically have nothing without the encryption key.
Plan a Strategy
Having an IT strategy can dictate how your business handles and protects data. According to International Business Machines (IBM), a comprehensive data security strategy includes people, processes, and technologies.
There are various ways to construct an IT strategy that makes information security a priority in the business. Examples of these strategies include physical security of servers and user devices, access management and controls, application security, and the latest patching of software.
Always Prepare a Backup
Have you heard how Toy Story 2 almost didn’t make it to the cinema? Well, if you didn’t you can look it up and read the whole story. To summarize, the movie was deleted by one of the animators of Pixar by just accidentally entering the deletion command code.
Even the film’s backups that were saved only allotted 10% of the whole film. But thanks to Galyn Susman, the supervising technical director of the movie, she had kept all the files on her personal home computer because she was working from home at the time.
The moral of this story essentially highlights the importance of backups. In the right hands, there are never enough backups of your data because you never know when accidental events can happen. Thanks to today’s technology, you can also use the cloud to effectively store and secure your data.
Hire an IT professional
This goes without saying that you must hire knowledgeable IT professionals in order to further protect your data. IT professionals can secure your PCs and network against malicious software. This software can damage your data and quickly spread throughout your system without even you knowing.
An expert IT personnel not only installs firewalls, but also protects PCs, and keeps emails clean from phishing schemes. At the same time, they also keep your wireless network secure, safeguard passwords and conduct thorough background checks. The best part is that having a good relationship with your IT guys can lead to collaboration in proactive planning on the cybersecurity of your business’s data.
Set Protective Protocols
Aside from installing on-site cybersecurity, a responsible business owner must also have protective protocols set up with its employees. Big or small businesses, you must be vigilant in hiring new employees because your data must be safeguarded against internal threats. Also, having a large amount of data over the years can be hard to store, archive and track.
To prevent this, sort out relevant data that you might still use and properly dispose of those you don’t need. Clearing out data that is no longer required must be done in an appropriate manner to prevent the risk of a security breach.
Educating Yourself and Your Employees
The best way to protect the data assets of your business is through the education of all employees. If you have educated employees, they will understand the risk of mismanagement and breach of company data. You can observe this in big corporations where they ensure employees are informed of compliance regulations and internal cybersecurity policies.
Higher management employees are trained and given clear guidelines in handling sensitive types of data. As a business owner, you should be educated in cybersecurity concepts for you to be not kept in the dark.
Vault Your Papers
If you still have paper documents that contain sensitive data, store them in a secure location. Cyberattacks cannot reach your paper documents but it is comparatively easy for a person to steal paper documents. Store sensitive documents in a secure location where moisture cannot reach and only trusted employees can access them.
If there are paper documents that you don’t need anymore, be sure to dispose of them safely using a paper shredder.
Key Takeaway
Data serves as the lifeblood of the company. Depending on the data, it can be an important asset like a client’s financial data or your company’s intellectual property. Investing in security solutions that safeguard your data is essential to prevent web threats, data thefts, and cyberattacks that can leave your business biting the dust.
Choosing what security protocols to implement must be taken into careful consideration. This is to prevent unnecessary expenses.