5 Reasons Langley Businesses Are Compromised by A Data Breach (And How to Avoid It)

Acclaimed cybersecurity reports indicate that data breaches aimed at small business enterprises are at an all-time high. Business owners have been forced to take a more proactive role in helping safeguard their Langley BC businesses against malicious cyberattacks. Still, movement to the cloud and the increased use of web-based tools makes it hard to protect the business from all forms of attack. The increased sophistication and maliciousness of these attacks have made a solid investment into cybersecurity more paramount.

Why You Should Protect Your Langley Company from Data Breaches

Prevents Revenue Loss
A data breach can lead to financial theft, sales reduction, and loss of market share. Following the illegal or unauthorized access to business data, operations are disrupted. This might lead to the loss of customers and work time, resulting in a decline in profits.

Prevention Against Damaging of Brand Reputation
Customers need to trust your brand. This is especially true when your business requires customers to give their data and credit card information. Data breaches make these customers think you are not committed to the protection of the data mentioned above. They might believe you are not diligent and do not invest in being vigilant against said data breaches. Overall, the breach makes your brand unreliable.

Prevention Against Loss of Intellectual Property
Data breaches will often result in cyber theft. Hackers end up copying intelligent information, which would lead to loss of patents or leaks of your competitive advantage. This is particularly concerning for businesses that deal with proprietary products.

Avoidance of Hidden Costs 
When a data breach can be traced to your company, you are liable for fines from affected customers and businesses alike. Notably, the Federal Trade Commission might insist on a fine, primarily when you are found to have been in contravention of current regulations. Besides, you incur the cost of informing the affected parties, investigating the breach, and embarking on the cleanup. Further, following a data breach, you incur a productivity cost. Your employees will often be swamped with having to clean up the resulting damage. Finally, the loss of reputation and trust might lead to losses in the long run.

Protection from Digital Vandalism
A data breach can deface the digital assets of your business. This is concerning as it might lead to permanent damage of your technological infrastructure. In less complex situations, you might have to deal with the nuances of being freeze out of your system or being subjected to ransomware.

Common Reasons Businesses Face Data Breaches

With the development of cybersecurity, it is easy to identify common targets and methods applied by hackers. Overall, businesses face data breaches due to:

Stolen Information
Your employees might expose you to a data breach when they misplace their passwords or personal devices. A computer or a phone is all a hacker needs to access your data. Additionally, employees need to be sensitized about how to protect their passwords.

Password Phishing 
Password phishing is considered a brute-force attack that applies social engineering to steal data from you or your employees. A hacker sends emails to individuals within the organization urging the recipient to click on a link. After that, the attacker can easily install malware into your system and phish for critical passwords.

Using of Keyloggers
A hacker with access to personal or business computers can install the malware above and record what you or your employees type. Sensitive information uploaded to databases, including names and other important information is then accessible to the data miner.

Outdated Systems
Most businesses keep an information inventory. At present, this sensitive information is stored in electronic files. Unfortunately, a business might not stay up-to-date with the cybersecurity programs in place. This exposes your business to malware and threats. It would be best if you considered getting a paid program and consistently updating it for improved cybersecurity.

Lack of Internal Controls to Guard Against Employee Fraud

As a business, you want to limit the extent of each employee's access. You want to have a system that logs all employee interactions with your data bank. To further safeguard yourself and your business, consider segregating duties to prevent a single employee from having too much access.

Best Practice to Avoid Data Breaches

Even when you have invested in the best security measures available, data breaches remain a threat. Still, you can insulate yourself from any data breaches and consequential damages by taking the proper steps. Having these tools in place communicates that you have made data security a priority within your business. As part of your business management, incorporate these in your business.

• Have an Intrusion Detection and Prevention System in place.
• Relentlessly manage all vulnerabilities.
• Consistently configure your databases.
• Protect all email and web browsing against malware.
• Control of all network ports and protocols.
• Use of multifactor authentication for your logins.
• Conduct security awareness training for your employees.

You need to have an awareness training program that covers the response in the event of a data breach. As part of the program, you need to generate a policy for your employees. This should boost their awareness of risk factors within your business.

Steps in Response to A Data Breach

As a business, you need to have a clear strategy to respond to any data breach. Having a plan upfront reduces the overall liability in the event of said breach.

• Evaluate the source and extent of the data breach.
• Alert your IT department.
• Run a diagnosis of your system.
• Inform the authorities and affected clients.
• Conduct a post-breach cleanup exercise.
• Repair your reputation.
• Consider cyber insurance.

Espionage and malicious attacks plague most businesses today. Data breaches expose said businesses to significant financial strain and threaten their continuity. To combat the ever-conniving hacker, a business has to make attacker-informed security decisions. This includes identifying vulnerabilities and customizing your response to fit any data breach threats. At Coleman Technologies, we aim at improving every aspect of your business operations. Specifically, we provide custom IT services that ensure that your data is secure and that you have a disaster recovery plan in place in case of a data breach.