Small businesses have been urged to become “cyber streetwise,” in order to avoid the risk of internet attack. This article published by the BBC this morning states that an estimated 11 million internet-enabled devices were received as gifts throughout the UK over Christmas.
Stockport based Amshire IT Solutions, experts in IT Business security are warning that firms can be open to risk and abuse if they fail to take precautions as the government has launched “Cyber Streetwise” – a campaign to educate and change the way people view online safety.
Trevor Taylor, Managing Director of Amshire is keen to ensure that businesses are well prepared to ensure that their systems and processes are secure:
“Amshire have always stressed the need for everyone from one man band to larger companies to take security seriously, often users don’t until something happens.
“Because we are all connected now it has become easy for anyone with a little knowledge to hack into a system or account that is not well protected from the other side of the World. We have seen users who have lost some or all of their data in the past. Reason can vary from Cyber-attacks to hardware failure or theft”.
Trevor continued and explained the importance of taking the correct steps to back-up their data:
“Users often don’t take backups of their data relying on a single laptop or tablet to store all their files. This has now become an even bigger issue with things like CryptoLocker where all their data can be locked away with no way for them to retrieve without paying a ransom. If their machine happens to be connected to a network all the data on the network, as well as Cloud storage in Dropbox, SkyDrive etc., could also be locked away. As always the best way to make sure you never suffer at the hands of these criminals is to backup of all the data in a secure way. Then it’s a simple job to delete the encrypted files and restore the data without having to pay a ransom fee, but don’t forget that any USB drive mapped to a network would also be encrypted so all backups needs to be secure and off line”.
By following a few simple steps, employers and their employees can alleviate risk.
“We have always encouraged users to change their passwords regularly and to make their passwords difficult to guess; most don’t do this as they can’t be bothered learning a new password. One way round this I’ve found to help remember a more secure password is to have your password as a memorable sentence / phrase such as “th3cowjump3dov3rth3moon” or “1d0ntl1kethera1nandc0ld”. By removing spaces and adding a few numbers it increases the complexity of the pass phrase making it a lot more difficult guess or crack, advises Trevor.
“One of the most used passwords worldwide is, would you believe, ‘password’. How easy is that to guess?!!. Besides passwords on the Pc or network, it is necessary to create a good password on social media sites as these are often the first thing the Cyber hackers try. Most users don’t change their social media password from one year to the next and they often have the web sites automatically login so if their phone / tablet or laptop is lost or stolen and there is not a secure password on it, it is easy for someone to get access to their accounts using their device.
“Cyber criminals rely on user complacency to get access to accounts. Users need to be more aware and take basic steps to secure their information”.
Latest figures produced from National Cyber Security Consumer Tracker give us all reason to make internet security one of our new year resolutions:
• Only 44% of people always install internet security software on new equipment
•Only 37% download updates and patches for personal computers when prompted – 21% for smartphones and mobile devices
•30% habitually use complex passwords to protect online accounts
•57% do not always check websites are secure before making a purchase
For more information visit BBC website and Amshire IT Solutions