Common Cybersecurity mistakes and how to stay one step ahead

Cybersecurity is essentially protecting devices we use on a day-to-day basis. The reason we all need cybersecurity is to keep our personal information we enter on our devices secure and private and prevent cybercrime.

Why is cybersecurity important?

Cybersecurity is important because without it you can risk all your personal or business information, i.e. bank details and customer details being compromised. If an unauthorised person (cybercriminal) was to come across this information because you did not protect it, you risk divulging sensitive information which can lead to loss of customers and legal action.

Assuming you’re not a target

Large or small companies can be vulnerable to cyber-attacks, you may think your small (five people  for example) company is safe because you only really hear about large organisations being targeted and their client’s data breached. This is wrong – anyone is a target, more so smaller companies who fail to secure their data.

You need to recognise that you are at risk and take the relevant steps to protect your devices and networks that hold data, do this by finding qualified security experts or software to assess your company’s vulnerabilities and secure them.

Not updating your software

Clicking update later when software updates are due can be tempting if you are in the middle of writing an important document or watching something. When you see these reminders, it means your software is due an update to ensure you are protected to the full level by clicking update later you are delaying the updates being done meaning your devices and data is not protected to the highest level it can be, and you are then vulnerable and at risk of cyber-criminal activity. To fix this it is easy, update when your updates are due. Do not delay as you may forget. It usually should not take long to do the updates either.

Using public Wi-Fi without a VPN

You may be out and about or at meetings elsewhere and quickly want to log on to check your emails, public places are hotspots for cybercriminals as your devices are not secure. You may connect to a network that is free and looks genuine, but these can be manipulated by hackers to look genuine and be dangerous.

The best way to ensure you are protected whilst off-site is to use a Virtual Private Network (VPN) on your device. This will encrypt traffic and make sure hackers come up blank.

Re-using the same passwords

Reusing passwords is something we all have done; we have the go to easy ones we will remember. This is a dream for cyber criminals if it is something easy to remember for you, it is possible with a bit of research cyber criminals will guess this.

Make sure your password is a mix of letters, numbers and special characters to make it more secure, you can use a password manager such as LastPass to keep track of these.

Not using Two-factor Authentication

Two-Factor authentication is when you must confirm your identity on a separate device. A lot of people can find this annoying and time consuming, but this is a perfect way to create a barrier to stop your personal information being compromised.

Overview

As you may know cybercriminals are always finding new ways to steal your personal information and customers data, by using all of the above methods and making them apart of your company’s policies to protect your devices and data, you can then be one step ahead of the cyber criminals!