In These Uncertain Times, Make Sure Your IT’s Security is Squared Away

Before we get too far into it, we wanted to clarify that—as of this writing, at least—there have been no specific threats levied against organisations in Australia. Having said that, it is still important that you prepare for the possibility of such attacks.

Let’s go over the practices that need to be adopted by you and your whole team in order to sidestep cybersecurity issues before these issues interfere with your capabilities. These practices are critical to adopt to help protect your accounts, passwords, emails, devices, and all the sensitive data you rely upon.

What Practices Should I and My Users Pick Up?

There are a few steps that can help protect your data from threats:

Think, Before You Click

This is some of the most basic advice we can give, but also one of the most effective at fighting phishing attacks. Whenever you find a link in an email or elsewhere online, you need to take a few things into consideration before clicking through it. For example, does a link’s text match the website it supposedly goes to when you hover your mouse over it? Does it make sense for a link to be included in an email? Keeping an eye out for these warning signs will help to minimize the threats that need to be actively dealt with.

Use a Strong Password, Supported by MFA

Password hygiene is one of our favorite topics to discuss, as—despite passwords gradually becoming less and less effective as time goes on and better ways of bypassing them are developed—they are still the baseline security measure. This means that various best practices need to be upheld (using a unique and sufficiently complex password or passphrase). 

However, to help reinforce your accounts and other assets, we strongly recommend that you implement multi-factor authentication. MFA adds another authentication requirement to the login process, relying on a separate identifier that is more challenging for a cybercriminal to replicate, like a biometric identifier or an additional code, generated on demand.

Secure all Your IT

Maintenance is the unsung hero of cybersecurity, as it isn’t enough to just have installed a few precautions and left them to do their job. With the evolving nature of cyberthreats, your cybersecurity needs significant upkeep in order to stay effective. From the devices that power your employees’ productivity to the infrastructure that these devices integrate with, you need to maintain an acceptable level of security across your network. 

Keeping the operating system and all software you have up-to-date and patched for security, with the requisite anti-malware and authentication measures in place, will help keep your IT safe from threats.

Ensure Everyone is Trained

Everyone—EVERYONE—in your business needs to be trained up in cybersecurity practices so that they are as prepared as possible to spot and properly respond to potential threats. From phishing training to the aforementioned password practices, anyone involved in your business needs to understand and appreciate the importance of your security practices and policies. Otherwise, your protections will only be as secure as your weakest link.

Report Suspicious Activity

Finally, it is crucial that your team not only knows what constitutes suspicious activity, but also knows how they are to proceed when they spot something suspicious. Or, in more specific terms, knows they are to report any suspicious activity to your business’ IT resource. Doing so will help ensure your team members don’t inadvertently play into a threat actor’s hands as they try to resolve an issue for themselves.

eManaged can be that IT resource for you. Find out more about our managed IT and security services by calling 1300 363 308.