October is the National Cyber Security Awareness Month. This is an event hosted by the Department of Homeland Security, in partnership with the National Cyber Security Alliance. This annual event encourages everyone to play their part in keeping their everyday online lives safe and secure. Hackers can attack anyone at their leisure. Therefore, it is up to you to be aware of security solutions and practices. This effort will prevent the loss of your data and secure your systems.
To be more secure and to take the right security solutions, we debunked three common cybersecurity misconceptions below:
1 - It’s personal.
Keep in mind that when you are cyber-attacked, it’s often not personal and it’s just code. Hackers use bots or any other automated methods to look for vulnerable code or unpatched servers. These are just lines of code intent on finding vulnerabilities. Finding the right security solutions or applying good security practices to your online efforts will stop these snippets of code from attacking you. Here are a few things you can do to defend yourself from these automated attacks:
● Use strong passwords.
● Update software and plugins.
● Review firewall settings.
● Lockdown traffic as much as possible.
● Close off any ports that are not required by websites and applications you use.
● Unless absolutely necessary to be public, lockdown things only to internal access.
2 - Only professionals can provide security solutions.
While it is true that they provide excellent security solutions, they can only do so much. You also need to take part in making sure that you are secure and safe online. Applying effective security practices will truly benefit you. So, what exactly are these smart security practices?
● Minimize using public WIFI connection when sending critical data or updating applications or websites.
● Keep your antivirus software up-to-date.
● Visit only websites you are sure that are clean and secure.
● Create a security policy.
● Do not rely on just one person or company to protect you.
● Make sure that your employees or your team know the risks when accessing unsecure sites, files, or applications using company resources.
● Educate your employees or team about common attack vectors and teach them to identify and report attacks (e.g., phishing emails). Also, they should be cautious in accessing valuable and sensitive company data.
3 - Cybersecurity is a one-time process.
Creating strong passwords and updating your software are just the first steps in keeping you secure from cyber attacks. The following steps require you to keep on reviewing your systems and system policies. Check out some tips to always be secured online:
● Keep up with the latest security trends.
● Change passwords every month.
● Implement the two factor or even multi-factor authentication.
● Always monitor software for updates.
Now that you know essential security practices let’s dive into three most common security issues that you may encounter.
Code injection. As the name implies, hackers inject malicious code into applications to exploit their vulnerabilities. It is the most common security issue and may lead to destroyed data, stolen credentials, as well as losing control over the server.
Data breach. According to the Breach Level Index, there were nearly 2,000 known data breaches in 2017 and 944 in the first half of 2018. Data breaches are caused by compromised credentials, software misconfiguration, malware, or even lost hardware. If businesses suffer from a data breach, they are required to notify their customers and regulatory authorities.
Malware infection. The primary vector of this type of attack is through email spam, and its malware comes from various sources. To prevent this infection from spreading in your network, you need an email scanning and filtering system. It is also impossible to find infected files and codes by hand, so automated tools will be needed to identify and delete them.
Hiring security solutions is also a good security practice. ITUNeed has a team of engineers and consultants that can help your organization secure your data and install and maintain security solutions to your infrastructure. Visit us at https://www.ituneed.com/ today and find the best security solutions for your company’s data protection!