Cyber Security: Best Practices Employees Need to Know
How often have you ignored cyber threats or maybe even fallen prey to random pop-ups or emails because they grabbed your attention? I am guessing it happens to most of us. Did you know more than 1.76 billion corporate records were leaked in 2019 alone? It was not some outside involvement but the employees’ own errors more often than not.
As cyber threats have continued to evolve ever since the
establishment of the internet, employees must understand the importance of cyber security.
With the commencement of COVID, securing the organization’s data
and preventing breaches became a real challenge for many companies since
everything went online, which made infringement even easier.
On most occasions, we never bother about the consequences of our
actions on the web and end up breaching our privacy due to our errors. Even
after several training programs that companies conduct, employees tend to
forget the practices that could become a security asset for them. Let’s address
the issues in question and solve them by following these best practices.
Learn to identify crooked emails and
pop-ups
Phishing emails are responsible for about 91 per cent of
cyber-attacks against large corporations. The one best practice that employees
should keep in mind is to avoid any unknown links, emails, or pop-ups.
The few tips that you should keep in mind to identify illicit
emails are:
Do not click on the link, but hover it instead to be aware of it
beforehand and only choose to visit the link if relevant.
Also, make sure you are familiar with the message’s source code to
detect the originating email address.
Try to get a second opinion of any email you suspect is
suspicious.
Practice Good Password Management
As obvious as it sounds, it is highly imperative to log in to the
computer systems through clever and unique passwords to protect your privacy
and your company’s. You must also be dynamic with passwords and keep
alternating them, for which a password management tool would come in handy.
65% of large companies have more than 500 employees who have never
changed their passwords. Ensure your passwords include an uppercase and a
lowercase and at least 8-10 characters, along with having multiple passwords
for distinct logins.
Don’t let yourself be fooled by fake business emails
Phishing also occurs in several forms. That involves even business
emails that pretend to arrive from officials but may propose unethical or
unofficial data and scam employees in the name of senior officials. The
unscrupulous cybercriminals play very smartly by searching for work emails of
officials and then requesting transactions along with sensitive information.
Create
Data Backups
Data backups are a general and one of the essential practice for
everyone to prevent themselves from violating their privacy, and that also applies to
employees who juggle loads of data. Employees must maintain regular backups for
future cyberattacks.
Use Malware and Virus Protection
Software
Whether it is COVID or data, protection is critical. Numerous
software tools have been built that help stops the breach of data or privacy
and must be installed before initiating work. Such software should be
preinstalled on behalf of the company itself and maintained by its IT
department.
Embracing Training Programs and
Always Being in Contact with the IT Department
The company’s IT department must ensure a safe workplace for the
employees, and hence, when they conduct such programs or workshops, they must
be scrutinized. The employees should communicate and collect advice from the IT
Department and report any malfunctions or suspiciousness from their side
immediately.
You can find cyber security
testing services here.
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