“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and a few minutes of cyber-incident to ruin it”–Stephane Nappo.
Reread these lines every time you think that cybercriminals’ most beneficial and prominent targets are companies like eBay, Dominos Pizza, or Facebook. While these companies are incredibly lucrative options, it’s equally difficult to break their numerous layers of security.
Though hackers prefer such lucrative businesses, they don’t mind attacking vulnerable businesses and get hold of some critical customer information. For these, your business is a low-hanging fruit, which is both profitable and easy to break in.
With a single cyberattack and security compromise costing $200,000 on an average, 60% of digital entrepreneurs go out of business within six months.
Still not convinced?
According to research, 43% of all security breaches are aimed at small businesses, and only 14% prepare in advance to defend their digital assets.
So, which side of the court do you want your business to stay?
That’s why every digital entrepreneur must invest in creating a secure online business in this digital age.
In this article, we will explore how to make your business secure without burning a hole in your pocket.
Top 6 Security Tips Every Digital Entrepreneur Should Follow in 2021
For tasting success in the fast-moving technological world, a digital entrepreneur should follow the zero-trust approach and protect everything by default. Here are six tips to start from.
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- Ensure compliance with laws
When Wonga Loans was under the attack of cybercriminals, they successfully accessed the bank details of 270,000 customers.
Had the General Data Protection Data (GDPR) been in place at that time, the company would have reduced the intensity and severity of the data breach.
How?
According to a leading GDPR guide, this regulation requires a business to protect customers’ data. As per the law, a business should collect only necessary data and provide a reasonable level of protection to their customers’ data. With GDPR, a customer has the right to access, correct, stop data processing, and delete data at any point.
Digital entrepreneurs who understand the importance of compliance have better visibility of their data and have an idea of how their business is using the customer data. They also collect less data to prevent costly non-compliance lawsuits.
Cybercriminals that gain access may not find exploitable data at such GDPR-compliant companies, thereby reducing the intensity of the breach. Companies with a well-planned GDPR program are more likely to understand their customer data and risk associated.
How does it save your money? According to Cisco research, GDPR ready companies experienced lower overall costs associated with data breaches. If you’re compliant with these laws, you can save your business thousands of dollars every year!
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- Focus on cyber hygiene
Just like personal hygiene, where you practice good habits to ensure a healthy life, cyber hygiene can protect your customer’s data. Maintaining a cyber hygiene routine can help you stop hackers from installing malware, stealing personal information, and causing data breaches.
From encrypting sensitive data, ensuring multi-factor authentication to using reputable cloud service and not using outdated and unsupported software, cyber hygiene is everything related to the security of your digital assets.
To make your business secure and reduce the probability of cyberattacks, make cyber hygiene a part of your routine. Regularly urge your employees to scan their system for viruses, update their operating system, change old passwords and clear their recycle bin.
How does it save your money? According to research, 81% of data breaches are due to poor passwords. Maintaining hygiene could make a difference to your online security.
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- Ensure security for online transactions
If you have an online business, you also have a reliable payment method integrated into your website. Fast and secure payment methods are one thing that helps in building trust with your customers.
That’s why you should consider investing in robust security transaction tools to make your website secure. Using an SSL certificate, you can establish trust. An SSL certificate can assure your customers that your website is authentic and completely safe to share their details.
SSL is as important to a website as a seat belt is important while driving a car. Apart from encrypting and locking your personal data, such a certificate provides authentication to your website. Also, a website with the SSL tag or HTTPS-enabled websites is given preference in the search engine ranking.
How does it save your money? Websites with an SSL certificate can have a conversion rate ranging from 18-87%. It can help you build a revenue-generating customer base.
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- Give preference to email security
In such a tumultuous time, when most of your workforce may be working from home, email is probably the best source for official communication. For hackers, emails are the weakest entry point. Your employees may unknowingly click on attachments or links that are malicious.
So, it’s imperative to focus on email security when creating your online security plan. Train your employees on ways to keep their email secure and teach them about common phishing tactics.
As far as possible, avoid opening links or attachments from unknown senders and untrustworthy sources.
Make sure you invest in software that can scan all emails for viruses.
How does it save your money? According to a report, losses from business email compromise (BEC) was $1.8 billion in 2020. Focus on your email security if you don’t want to be a part of this number.
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- Update your security patches
Did you know that hackers love security flaws? If a hacker discovers a possible software vulnerability before your developer, it becomes easy to gain access to the data.
That’s where the concept of security patches comes in.
A patch is a small code of software a company issues every time it detects a security vulnerability in its software. As the name suggests, a patch fills the hole (vulnerability), preventing the hackers from taking advantage of your security flaw.
Therefore, every time there is a software update or upgrade request from the developer or company, install it immediately. While a security patch can prevent your business from potential attacks, if you don’t install it’s as good as waste.
Neglecting the security patch update can jeopardize your business and open up your business’s vulnerability to hundreds of notorious online thieves.
How does it save your money? According to research, one in three online breaches involved software vulnerabilities for which a security patch was available.
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- Add layers to your data security.
An anti-virus alone may not be sufficient to deal with hackers who leave no stone unturned to gain unauthorized access. While no single security tactic is bulletproof, you can consider doubling up your firewall.
Why?
Your firewall is the weakest link of your network security because it can bring your network down and expose it to hackers. While buying more than one firewall may prove a costly affair, you can always rent a firewall just like your rent software. Firewall-as-a-service (FWaaS) is a growing field and can help you double up your firewall for the price of buying one.
To add another layer of security, focus on using Virtual Private Networks (VPNs). It helps protect your online traffic from cybercriminals because when you use a VPN, all your data is encrypted, and it’s an impossible task to decrypt this data. Furthermore, VPNs are affordable because you buy a VPN subscription from a third-party vendor.
How does it save your money? Every hacking starts with an IP address. A VPN can hide your original IP address and allocates a new IP address to the VPN server. As a result, your website is less prone to cyberattacks.
Parting advice
The security of your business is a proactive approach, and you need to make some investment to ensure your business is always up and running. While no business is entirely invulnerable to hackers, you can remove yourself from their hit list by focussing on these six tips.
To go one step ahead in ensuring protection for your business, try to assess the risk for your business. This is important because it helps you create a security plan, and you don’t waste time securing information that is already public.
Apart from these tips, you can focus on network hygiene, self-evaluate to keep pace with your compliance and risk, create a backup for critical data, and implement security policies. You can also conduct a security audit, purchase cyber risk insurance, secure your website domain, add security settings to your public cloud, maximize your cloud security with the container and use the latest technologies to make your business secure.
You don’t have to implement each of these tips. Based on your business requirement, make the best choice. Also, when you’re in doubt, don’t cheap out on your security; instead, research it to make an informed decision. Remember, it’s your business, and you have to ensure its security.
Which security measures are you planning to implement?
Share your thoughts in the comments section!
