The internet has opened countless doors for individuals who wish to seize opportunity to market themselves, their products and their services to the world at-large. Unfortunately, open doors leave predators and thieves with the ability to partake in your success as well. As your business or operation expands, it is bound to garner additional attention – some of that coming from shady people. If you are handling financial information provided by others, you owe it to yourself, your employees and your customers to have the best protection possible. We have laid out several areas in which cyber security is an absolute must.

User Training

Educating your employees in basic cyber security elements will help drastically reduce the instance of fraud, hacking and other compromising situations involving your company. A well informed workforce should be more adept at identifying potential security threats and identity theft attempts once understanding the basic elements of how such attacks work. Whether it pertains to pinging domains for backdoor access or phishing for information via email, your employees should be a functional first wall of defence against troublesome pests who wish to gain access to your servers and databases for the purpose of exploiting intellectual property and sensitive financial information.

System Protection

By installing basic security software to all of your computers and servers, you will be able to drastically reduce the likelihood that a criminal can gain access to your company’s information. The best way to do this is to have a central system that is responsible for managing network and computer scans across the company’s infrastructure; by having each computer configured to scan for viruses, threats and loopholes on a daily basis, you can rest assured that another layer of cyber security has been implemented. You should also enforce the separation of employees’ work-related business and their personal computing use (social networks, for instance).

Mobile Lockdown

No mobile device should have access to the company’s servers or software without being configured to be absolutely secure. A hacker can use a mobile device to engage in pinging domains, in the hope of finding some way to coercing your website into giving the hacker the information he or she wants. All mobile devices should be subject to a company-specific or proprietary set of software utilities that ensures there is no way in which a non-employee can access company data without an encrypted password or some other form of verification. Your employees may not like it, but it is vital in order to protect the company’s assets.

Discuss Issues With Banks

Any financial institution is adept at knowing what to do in the wake of a cyber security threat or attack. By collaborating with a bank or lender (preferably the one your company uses on a regular basis) before something happens, you can be more prepared on how to handle the matter and recoup any financial losses if the worst possible scenario occurs: outright theft of your company’s revenue. They will also be able to offer customized solutions for protecting your finances and preventing such a scenario from happening in the first place.