Cyber Security will stay dominant this year with its rapidly growing technologies and innovations, Cyber attackers are just as fast or even more innovative. Last year, some companies such as TalkTalk and Tesco Bank were attacked where hackers stole money from client’s accounts. Cyber Security is important for businesses of all sizes. Small businesses are just at risk of being victims of cyber-attacks as larger corporations, and that’s why it is important for SMEs to be prepared for attacks at all times.

When hackers attack large companies, they often make the headlines of news outlets across the globe. But that doesn’t mean hackers don’t target small businesses. On the contrary, small businesses have a lot of digital assets compared to an individual user. And more often than they have less security than large companies.

Small businesses are also targets because SMEs are less careful about cyber security. Majority of small businesses underestimate their risk level and think that they don’t have anything in their servers that are worth stealing.

Types of Cyber-Attacks

The goal of a cyber-attack is to steal sensitive data, whether it is personal data or credit card information. Hackers can use several types of cyber-attacks in order to achieve their goals. Below are just some cyber-attack techniques that small business owners should be aware of.

DDoS – Distributed denial of service attacks happen by overloading the server with requests. Their goal is to take down the network system or the website.

Malware – Hackers use malicious software to gain unauthorised access or cause damage to the computer or the network.

Phishing – One of the most common types of cybercrime is phishing. It involves the gathering sensitive data such as credit card information and login details through a legitimate-looking website. More often than not, unsuspecting individuals are directed to the phishing website via email.

Password Attacks – There are various types of password attacks that cybercriminals use. A brute force attack is when the hacker tries to guess the passwords until one gets in. Another type is the dictionary attack that utilises a program to try various combinations of words. Lastly, there’s key logging that tracks all the keystrokes of the users that include user IDs and passwords.

Inside Attack – This type of cyber-attack is when a person with administrative privileges misuses one’s credentials to gain access to confidential data. That’s why it is important to remove the access of former employees upon termination, especially if they left the company on bad terms.

APT – Advanced persistent threats are long termed attacks that break into a system in several phases to prevent detection.

A lot of small business owners are confident that they can recover from a cyber-attack. However, the recovery time from an attack often takes longer than their expectation. And during that time, they fail to fully maximise the use of their company’s network. If it involves an online shop, then they are losing potential sales because of the downtime.

And that’s why it is important for SMEs to know the importance of cyber security. Prevention is better than finding the solution after a cyber-attack. Cyber security solutions are also much cheaper compared to the recovery process after the attack. It is important or business owners to assume that they can be a victim of a breach, and that’s why they need to be preparing all the time.

Security has always been a priority for us. We help our customers to fight against viruses, security breaches and Ransomware etc.

Call our team on 0330 1224 420 or send an email to [email protected]. We help you to stay secure locally and in the Cloud.

More data was lost or stolen in the first half of 2017 than during the whole of 2016 according to reports.

1.9 billion records were leaked or stolen by criminals up to June 2017, compared to 1.37 billion during all of 2016. Digital security organisation Gemalto’s Breach Level Index was published in September 2017. It revealed that 10.4 million records are swiped or exposed every day.

Worldwide there were 918 reported breaches in the first half of 2017, just over 100 more than were reported in the last six months of 2016. During the first three months of 2017 more than a million records were lost, stolen or compromised.

According to Gemalto, less than 1 per cent of the lost, stolen or compromised data utilised encryption to make the information useless to the perpetrator: an exceptionally worrying statistic.

Cybercrime was responsible for the majority of data breaches (74 per cent) and malicious insider attacks 8 per cent.

Most data breaches occurred in North America, with the UK reporting the second highest number of incidents.

In total more than 28,000 data records were compromised in the UK in the first half of 2017, an increase of 130 per cent from the second half of 2016. 50 per cent of UK data breaches were down to malicious outside attacks and 30 per cent fell to accidental loss. 65 per cent were classed as identity theft.

Industry sector wise, government ranked the largest source of security incidents with 12 in the first half of 2017, followed by technology firms with 7 and the healthcare sector with 6.

The Breach Level Index has been running since 2013. It is designed to benchmark publicly disclosed data breaches. With the introduction of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in May 2018, it is reckoned that the numbers of disclosed breaches will see an exceptionally steep rise.

These statistics, and in particular the revelation that such a huge amount of compromised data did not use encryption in order to protect it from malicious use, reiterate the point we are stressing at every given opportunity: the vital importance of installing adequate cyber security measures across the entire business.

Remember, GDPR is nearly here and with it come even more stringent laws about how data is protected. Failure to comply with these new laws could result in fines topping millions of pounds.

What measures are you taking to protect your data?

In light of the findings of the most recent Breach Level Index, it is clear to see that cybercrime is on the up. Criminals are increasingly finding more and more underhand ways of accessing and stealing data. Are you certain you have all the measures in place you need to protect yours? Remember, cybercrime does not only come from external sources; a significant proportion of data compromise comes from within a business, which means ALL potential in-roads MUST be safeguarded.

At IQ in IT, cyber security is our core priority. With GDPR coming in just a few months’ time, we’re ensuring our clients are ready in all respects to protect against data breaches, ransomware and virus attacks. To request your cyber security review, simply get in touch: we’re here to help protect your business.