Cyber Security – how to establish, prepare and mitigate cyber attacks to minimise risk

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly changed the cyber threat landscape. Work-from-anywhere has become the new norm with 92% of global organisations adopting new technologies to facilitate the switch to remote operations. While this has created plenty of new opportunities for vendors, it highlights numerous security and privacy risks associated with remote work.

Whilst this means the cost of communicating with loved ones and work teams has become almost negligible, it also means the cost of digital, or cyber attacks have significantly escalated. This combined with the large profits of cyber crime, the wealth disparity between countries and continuing acts of cyber warfare, equates to cyber attacks are on the rise and constantly evolving.

As travel ceased, most businesses and services switched primarily to online operations. Those companies already online had to expand, introducing entirely new processes into their workflows. This rapid shift opened organisations up to cyber threats on a larger scale than ever before.

Protection has never been more critical. In fact, in 2020, a staggering 31% of global companies were attacked by cyber criminals at least once per day and in Australia every year there are thousands of cyber breaches. Understanding the cyber threat landscape is key to staying safe online.

Another way to think about it – if there is a bank vault which has no lock and lots of money which can be accessed almost instantly from around the world, do you think people will try and steal the money? Businesses which don’t have sufficient cyber protections are like that unlocked bank vault, waiting for a cyber attacker to test out their security. The clock is already ticking.

Martin Boyd from Vertex Cyber Security shares,

“Now is a great time to start thinking about improving your Cyber Security but choosing where to start can feel daunting – you might have heard of Penetration Testing (Ethical Hacking to find your vulnerabilities), ISO27001 compliance, Cyber Security Audits, Cyber Security Policies, Firewalls, AntiVirus, Managed Cyber Security, Cyber Training, Cyber Security Products and the list goes on.”

This link shares other case studies to review enabling you to mitigate risk to your business – Cyber Security case studies

1. Teach your employees to be Cyber Safe and prepared for phishing attacks by performing regular refresher training
2. Setup browser phishing protection such as XSurfLog, to detect and protect against phishing links
3. Setup a password manager to ensure only secure passwords are used
4. Setup advanced email filtering to reduce phishing emails and
5. Setup Two-Factor Authentication across your organisation.

Coraggio, CEO, Richard Skarzynski cites,

“Regardless of the industry sector, data is increasingly at the forefront of business operations and decision making and its loss, even temporarily, may have massive financial and reputational company damage.”

In conclusion, with the pandemic still underway driving business operational decisions, expect more cyber threats in 2022. Work-from-anywhere is here to stay and it’s unclear whether we’ll ever make a full return to traditional office setups, therefore staying cyber safe is the “next normal”.

Anti-malware agents may stop a cyber threat in progress, however won’t be able to restore any compromised data. Backup agents won’t automatically know about a cyber threat and data will be recovered slowly — assuming that it hasn’t been compromised. Security patches to fix vulnerabilities in popular software are released frequently, however these are inconsequential if not enabled across your workloads in a timely manner.

With these challenges ahead, it’s important businesses invest in solutions that can address the top cyber threats head-on and provide comprehensive cyber protection mitigating risk for your business.

Afterall, in the words of Henry Ford

“If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself”.