Ensuring your office IT is secure is one of the most important aspects of your IT infrastructure.  Keeping your IT secure doesn’t have to involve complex or expensive methods either.  Providing robust security for your office IT can prevent expensive data breaches and ensure your hardware doesn’t need to be replaced sooner than necessary.  By following a few simple methods, you can ensure your office’s IT and team members stay secure.

Security Methods to Follow

Remember that you are always a potential target from cyber threats.  Hackers and other cyber criminals cast a wide net, often using specialized tools to infect devices, scam users, and take advantage of security flaws.  There are many instances where they may not even know who they are targeting – only that the data and potential quick cash can be had by exploiting that target.  Luckily, it’s easy to prevent these scams and vulnerabilities by following a few steps.

  • Keeping Software Updated – Ensuring your software is up-to-date is one of the best ways of preventing hackers from taking advantage of security vulnerabilities. Often times, updates patch up vulnerabilities and also provide other useful changes. Be it Windows, an application, or a device, like your phone or tablet, keeping your devices updated is a sure way to help keep them secure.
  • Educate Your Staff About Phishing Scams – Phishing scams are methods cyber criminals employ to trick potential victims into providing private data, such as a password or banking information, in response to a legitimate looking email. These emails can often be hard to spot and, sometimes, can infect victims with malware through embedded pictures or send users to scam websites through links. Natural Networks can help you and your staff identify and avoid potential phishing emails through training methods and a robust spam filter.
  • Use Strong Passwords – Passwords are often one of the most overlooked security protocols when it comes to IT security. Unfortunately, some of the most common passwords are used the most and, therefore, the easiest for cybercriminals to crack. Passwords, like qwerty, Password1, password2020, qazwsx, and other common key combinations should never be used by you or your employees. When creating passwords, it’s important to make sure they are strong, secure, and unique to the person creating them. The longer a password is the more difficult it will be to guess. A trick for creating long passwords is to use a phrase and replace certain characters with symbols or numbers. Remember to never share your password with anyone and update your password periodically. You can also employ a password manager to help generate secure passwords and store them for you, so you only need to remember one master password.
  • Ensure Computers and Devices Lock After Periodic Non-Use – During the work day, there are moments where you must leave your computer to go and take a break, grab something from the printer, or participate in a meeting. It is during these times that it is essential that these devices self-lock after a few minutes of non-use. Most mobile devices already do this, but ensuring that your computer self-locks even after a short time frame is a good idea as well. Another convenient locking method is requiring facial recognition or fingerprints to unlock your workstations and devices providing even more security by eliminating the need for a password.  This use of biometrics in place of standard passwords has proven to be extremely effective in securing technology.
  • Keep a Backup Solution for Your Data – A good backup solution is one of the most important aspects to data security today. Having a backup solution that backs up your company data both onsite and in a secure cloud is necessary in case of a natural disaster or if it is ever stolen in a data breach.  Ensuring you can restore your data if it’s ever lost or stolen will allow you to get back to work faster and is a necessary factor for many business insurance policies nowadays.

Natural Networks is a fully managed IT solutions provider with the staff and training that can help your business identify potential security threats and address them.  If you want to learn more about how you can keep your IT infrastructure secure, give us a call today!