Should Your Small Business Worry About Cybersecurity?

Small businesses are common targets for cyber-crime, and the outcome of a data breach can be quite damaging.

It is common for small business owners to overlook their risk for cyber-attacks. However, hackers are becoming increasingly intelligent in their ability to access small businesses’ networks and access potentially sensitive information, such as employee customer emails, home addresses and phone numbers. This is why you should consider cybersecurity an important issue for your business.

Why Cybersecurity Is Important for Small Businesses

In most cases, hackers do not know what type of information you are storing until they break into your network gain access to your data. Therefore, even if your business does do not store sensitive data, your business may still be at risk for a data breach.

An article published by Small Business Trends reveals concerning cybersecurity statistics for small businesses. Small businesses are targeted in 43 percent of cyber-attacks, yet a mere 14 percent of small business owners report they are confident in their ability to mitigate a cyber-attack.

Cybersecurity Standards and Partnering with Larger Corporations

Today, many small businesses serve as third partner suppliers to larger companies. Often, this relationship involves a trusted gateway between the two companies. Cyber criminals look for the path of least resistance to access confidential data.

Because of this, large corporations usually expend time and effort researching the cybersecurity practices of the businesses they partner with, especially small businesses. You should have a defined cybersecurity policy in place to help aid in any due diligence investigations.

If you are beginning to examine cybersecurity standards for your small businesses, this publication authored by the National Institute of Standards and Technology is a good place to start –  it is specifically tailored for small businesses. The guide digests the topic of cybersecurity into a framework of six actionable domain areas.

Educate Your Team to Implement Cybersecurity Best Practices

Small business leaders need to equip their employees with the skills to recognize the risks of a data breach, as well as how to appropriately react to threats. Programs are available that provide cybersecurity risk assessments, which will define your company’s strengths, weaknesses, and can save your business time and money by developing a proper cybersecurity risk management policy.

If your Arkansas small business would like to prepare for potential cyber-attacks and data breaches, contact the IT security experts at Scale, or call 501-588-3199 to start the conversation.