What is Cyber Security?

Pretty much everyone has heard of the buzzwords ‘Cyber Security’, but do you know what is cyber security? In simple terms, it is the practice of defending IT systems from attacks originating from the internet.

A 2018 study from Gartner showed that by 2022, the global cyber security market is expected to reach $170.4 billion.

Why is cyber security important?

Often, you don’t think about cyber security until you need it but it’s not just business data you need to protect, but personal data also. There are three main things to consider:

• The costs of cyber security breaches – from privacy laws to business data to reputational damage
• Cyber attacks are increasingly sophisticated
• Cyber crime is huge – the cost of cyber crime is likely to cost the world $6 trillion by 2021 according to a report by Cybersecurity Ventures.

What exactly does this mean for YOUR business?

Being aware of cyber security is the first step to getting protection for your business and customer information. However, a lot of businesses don’t know about the next steps, and what action is needed to be taken. One of the things you can do is to get Cyber Security Accreditation.

What is Cyber Security Accreditation?

Via a nationally recognised accreditation, your company’s systems will be independently assessed and the required level of protection (as recommended by the National Cyber Security Centre known as Cyber Essentials) implemented, to help prevent the most common cyber threats will be included.

This secures your internet connection, devices and software, protects from malware and viruses and reassures customers that you are working to secure your IT and data from cyber attacks.

Do I need to be accredited?

Cyber Essentials accreditation is for all organisations, of all sizes, and in all sectors. Have a chat with one of our Security Team to see whether accreditation would be suitable for your business, get IT support with our help desk or email enquiries@lcsit.com.

Quick Changes To Improve Cyber Security

1. Staff Awareness Training

   This might not seem to be IT related but it is. For example, do your staff have access to their work emails on their personal devices, such as mobile phones, tablets or home PCs?  If the answer is yes, then are you confident that these devices are adequately protected with passwords and encryption. Are you sure that only authorised people have access to their business emails?

2. Access Controls

   This definitely sounds more ‘techy’ but is a relatively simple step to help protect your business. If you restrict what staff can access you restrict the amount of data a hacker can view, should an account be compromised. Make sure staff only have access to what information they need to do their job.

3. Password Management Policy

   This is perhaps the biggest problem. Humans are creatures of habit, we like familiarity and that is why a large percentage of the UK population still use ‘password’, ‘123456’ or ‘qwerty’ as their passwords. Creating a policy which will guide your staff to create strong, easy to remember, unique, passwords is imperative. You could consider using a password manager like LastPass.

These are just a few suggestions that are free or relatively cheap to implement.  The cost of NOT taking cyber security seriously can run into hours of downtime, fines for data protection breaches and the reputation of your company.

We will be adding more Blog IT articles specifically relating to cyber security but if you would like some friendly advice in the meantime, why not speak to one of our Accredited Cyber Essentials (ACE) Practitioners about your cyber needs? Give us a ring on 01522 718396.