If you run a business, then you need to keep an eye on security. This is true now more than ever. When hackers can break into The Pentagon, a major credit bureau, and Fortune 500 companies, your company is certainly vulnerable too. And it isn’t just major targets these cybercriminals are after. Here is why your company is also at risk of a security hack:
Customer Data
If you are a business, that means you have customers or clients. And these customers are all valuable inherently to criminals online that wish to get their data. That is why you need to protect it however you can.
For instance, hackers might be interested in the credit card details of your customers. Thus, they might inject code on your site by hacking your servers. Therefore, when the customer is checking out they think they are using a secure portal. In reality, their information is being stolen by a third party even though the website still looks the same because of the code being run in the background.
Other times, the criminals are interested in getting information like social security numbers and stealing identities. However, even if none of this is true, there is value in a list of customers. The hackers now know who you do business with and can easily sell this list to your competitors who now have a direct line of communication via emails and phone numbers to steal your customers.
Phishing
Your company is at risk through phishing as well. This entails a process whereby the hacker will send emails to your employees. The emails will purport to be from someone with high authority, such as a CEO of your company or a financial executive at your company’s bank.
When the employee clicks on the email and then the link within the email to help out this fake person, a piece of code is run on their system. This allows the hackers to gain access to their computer. However, it gets worse. As time goes on, the hacker is able to gain access to other computers on the system and their information, all from being undetected.
Man in the Middle
A man in the middle attack (MiTM) is when a cyber threat places themselves in the middle of communication between two devices on your network. For instance, everyone’s computer and phone at your office is connected to the same system. However, the hacker will trick both ends of the network and intercept communications.
Once they have intercepted these communications, they can be invisible on the network. That means each time something encrypted like a password or secret trade data is transferred, it is actually being sniffed out before it reaches the secure layer of your network. The only way to detect if something like this is happening is through proper network penetration testing. That way you can see the network in real time and stop any threats in their tracks.
Website Security
Your website is one of the key places that you are most vulnerable today and network security is essential. You might think that you control your website because you have access to the backend. However, while this may be true, a hacker can also gain access to your site.
If you have comment boxes or other fields that accept text, they might also accept lines of code. This could mean that someone with the right skills could execute commands. Be sure to block this kind of cross site scripting by having your IT department set it up on the backend.
When it comes to putting your business in the best position to succeed, many think of sales, marketing, and customer service. However, it is a big mistake to avoid your security as well. If you don’t have the right measures in place, you could be hacked and lose customer information, financial data, and other private secrets that could ruin your reputation, hurt others, and put you in a world of trouble. So take security seriously and maintain your peace of mind.
