Online security, also known as cybersecurity, is a term becoming popular each day with each year. However, with cybercriminals becoming stronger each day and bringing in the most advanced technologies to hack into corporate devices and leaking mass data, one can only fear this situation.
The question today does not remain ‘Is there a need to protect my business online?’, but somewhat like ‘How much more can I protect my business online?’. The world has gotten worse with technological innovations, and cybersecurity for small businesses has never felt so crucial to maintain.
In times like these, small businesses that have no clue about online security need to address this situation and fear the consequences while doing their best to stay protected over the internet.
While multiple services and cybersecurity tools are available for this, the usage of a VPN has its significant value. With many VPN services in the UK, small businesses can protect themselves before they face any data breach.
Now that we’ve mentioned the need for cybersecurity in the UK, let us share with you five security tips to save your small business from any data breaches.
5 cybersecurity tips for small businesses to stay protected
1. Protect your devices
The first and the most basic advice we can offer you is to protect your devices from any kinds of threats. Unfortunately, most small businesses usually worry about safeguarding their software more than the hardware itself, resulting in an equally dangerous proposition if you think about it.
A hardware theft would easily give away all your data and everything you had been trying to keep confidential from everyone else. While you cannot ultimately save your device from theft unless you use surveillance cameras or lock up your device somewhere, you can always password protect your device using a super-complex password.
If you’re a small business and do not have a vast number of devices at your workplace, then they’re easier to protect. You just need to save the passwords of all the devices in a central vault like a password manager. Password managers like Dashlane, LastPass, and 1Password are amazing at what they do and will store all your passwords and save them with a master code.
2. Use an effective antivirus
Antiviruses are cheap and highly effective cybersecurity tools that one needs to protect its small business from malicious software.
Antiviruses are known to notify you immediately if you’re about to download a malicious file on your device or if there is a virus detected on your computer.
You might want to opt for the cheapest antivirus software due to your small budget, but remember that you should always get an antivirus that can combat all evolving and advanced viruses and malware. We would recommend Microsoft Defender or Bitdefender Antivirus.
3. Use an effective VPN
As mentioned before, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) is one effective way to keep your small business safe from all kinds of cyberattacks. A VPN is known to keep all your data encrypted and offer you a secure connection.
VPNs let you connect to a global server, so no one knows where you’re based or uses your location against you. VPNs create a tunnel between you and the network or website you’re accessing, so not even the government can snoop into the network.
A VPN will maintain your online anonymity while letting you access any website which wasn’t accessible to you within the country before. You should set up a VPN on all your corporate devices to have an entirely encrypted network with no chances of any data breaches.
4. Backup your data
Another important thing you can do to heighten your cybersecurity is to back up all your corporate data in hard drives or somewhere safe, so even if you face device theft, your corporate data is secure with you.
There are always chances of spyware or ransomware getting into any of your corporate devices while one of your employees is trying to access a website or download a file. Ransomware usually locks a file and asks for ransom in these cases. However, even with the paid ransom, you’re unsure whether the data would be recovered or not.
Therefore, to be super-careful about it, you should back up all your business’s confidential data on encrypted devices to protect them from all kinds of harm.
5. Train your employees
One last thing you can do is raise awareness about cybersecurity and train your employees in case any kind of data breach takes place, or they feel something suspicious happening around them.
One significant thing you need to train your employees on is not to get into the trap of phishing emails. Phishing emails are one of the easiest ways for hackers to steal corporate data. While these emails look extremely real, they’re not always authentic.
Stats say that 96% of phishing attacks are received through emails. Therefore, you need to spend a part of your small business’s budget on training your employees to be able to detect a problem and what to do in case of a cyber attack.
Conclusion
While small businesses believe hackers or cybercriminals won’t target them as much as they’d try to target a large corporation, they’re wrong. Cybercriminals keep small businesses under their radar and attack them as soon as they find a vulnerability or the right time. Therefore, it’s better that you protect your small business online to remain completely secure, or at least try to.
