“We needed to find solutions to a variety of issues whilst being a complex business, operating in a 24/7 environment. Stripe OLT listened and understood immediately the challenges we faced.”
“We needed to find solutions to a variety of issues whilst being a complex business, operating in a 24/7 environment. Stripe OLT listened and understood immediately the challenges we faced.”
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“We needed to find solutions to a variety of issues whilst being a complex business, operating in a 24/7 environment. Stripe OLT listened and understood immediately the challenges we faced.”
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As Christmas approaches, many of you will be winding down and preparing for the festivities – unfortunately, cyber criminals notoriously take advantage of the holiday season, coercing their way into our digital spaces and cashing in on the season of giving.
With this in mind, here are our cloud and security experts 12 top-tips, to ensure that your business and workforce, stay one step ahead of the hackers.
“Phishing emails advertising the latest ‘Christmas Deals’ or spoofing well known parcel delivery service providers are very common tactics used by malicious actors.
Never trust an email and always check the wording of carefully, and then check it again! Also remember to check the sender, was it really sent from Amazon…? By putting a bit of thought into how we respond to our digital correspondence we can avoid providing digital criminals with the information and access they are trying so hard to gain.”
“The biggest threat our clients face is phishing and social engineering: always check the sender’s address and any links included. Hovering over a link will show you where it’s taking you; if in any doubt don’t click it! The safer option is always to open a new browser and navigate to a specific website yourself without clicking any risky links.”
“Everyone knows that strong passwords are annoying to remember, however the dangers associated with being compromised far outweigh the pain it takes to remember! For example, an 8-character password takes roughly 5 hours to crack when it’s all in lowercase text. The key is to use a password which contains a minimum of 12 characters that include numbers, symbols, capital letters mixed with lower-case letters. To protect your employees that step further we also recommend MFA is enforced on all user accounts for that extra piece of mind!”
“Use a password management tool to ensure that each password for each service is different – their memory is better than yours! Password managers generate uniquely strong passwords that you don’t need to remember.”
“Sadly passwords get stolen, leaked or disclosed to people who shouldn’t have them, almost no matter what safeguards you might use. So having a strategy to stay ahead of anyone who would try to use your accounts is key to success. Enabling Multi-Factor Authentication (aka MFA/2FA) on EVERYTHING can improve your online security immeasurably.
MFA will challenge anyone who uses your password to provide a secondary authentication factor such as a code, phone call or push notification in a mobile app. Even when a malicious actor has your password, without your second factor they still can’t breach your account in most cases.”
“When out and about enjoying your company Christmas meals, never connect to public wifi! You never know who is listening…”
“Ensure you employ someone to look at the alerts from anti-virus software and monitoring agents – it’s all well and good having managed devices, but without someone watching the logs you can’t react in time!”
“Restoring and protecting your data go hand in hand. I would recommend running onsite and offsite backup simultaneously to protect against all eventualities, in addition to having a disaster recovery plan in place to ensure the fasted revival time. When a crucial system goes down, knowing what to do, who will do it and where the backup data is stored means your business will be up and running again in the fastest possible time.
‘Over 28,000 people fell victim to fraud during last year’s Christmas shopping period. To successfully fight against malicious actors this year, it is critical that businesses foster a cyber-security culture through education and security best practices. I’d recommend starting awareness training during employee onboarding and follow an official cyber security training plan.’
“This model essentially acts under the impression that all users and devices trying to access the network are threats. Make sure your network users use robust authentication measure, make sure you segment your network, and definitely adopt a least privileged access model.”
“SIEM tools allow security analysts to investigate security alerts in real-time, which reduces the average time to identify and respond to breaches. IBM say the average time to respond to a breach in 2020 was 207 days – which is why a SIEM tool should be at the top of everyone’s Christmas list this year!”
“Work proactively, not reactively! Don’t wait until malicious actors find a network vulnerability to exploit and actively test your infrastructure and applications with a Penetration Test to uncover any weaknesses ahead of time.”
If you’re looking to improve your business security going into the new year, get in touch with one of our team.
