Top 5 tactics to avoid the costs of a data breach

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Data breaches are rapidly becoming an unavoidable expense for businesses across the globe. In fact, a recent study by IBM revealed that over 83% of organisations have experienced one.

What is a data breach, you ask? A data breach is a security violation that results in the leakage or loss of private, sensitive or confidential information. This could be information belonging to your business, your employees or your customers.

There are various unfriendly costs associated with a data breach. The cost of the breach itself. The cost of your team’s time and productivity. The cost of losing business as your customers lose trust in you. Oh, and the inevitable legal costs that come with handling all of the abovementioned.

The average cost of all cyber security breaches is climbing year on year. For businesses in the UK, there is an average cost of $3.88 million per breach, according to IBM’s data breach study.

To make matters worse, a subsequent 60%  of small companies go out of business within six months of a cybersecurity breach – making this one of the largest threats to business owners in the modern day.

Whilst these statistics might feel like a hard pill to swallow, there is hope. With the right tactics in place, your business can avoid falling victim to cyber crime. In this article, we will be sharing our top 5 tactics to avoid the costs of a data breach.

How to avoid the costs of a data breach

1.        Employee Cyber Security Training

Making sure your team are cyber-aware is one the best ways to avoid a data breach. By providing thorough and regular training, your team can be equipped to detect and respond to a cyber security breach before it has the chance to do any damage.

There are various advanced tools and e-learning platforms that you can use to strengthen your staff’s knowledge on cyber security. Generally, these tools will educate your team without them even knowing by sending fake phishing emails and tests that will teach your team what to look out for. These tools will provide you with a comprehensive report on your team’s overall cyber security awareness – and the areas they need to scrub up on.

If working with an IT support provider, like Virtuoso, this training can be setup and conducted on your behalf. We work with our customers to provide regular advanced training that ensures their staff are always aware of the latest scamming techniques.

2.       Introduce Multi-Factor Authentication

MFA (Multi-Factor Authentication) is a simple yet brilliant way to prevent cyber criminals from infiltrating sensitive company data. We encourage all our customers to implement MFA, as it’s quick and easy.

In short, MFA will ask your staff to introduce multiple ways of verifying their identity when accessing a platform or system holding company data. This could be in the form of an OTP (one-time password) sent to their phone, or a unique code sent to their MFA application. This tactic means that even if a cyber criminal were to get hold of your employees’ username and password, they wouldn’t be able to access systems without also obtaining their personal device – making it an effective method of protection.

If you want more information on MFA and how to use it, we’ve got a helpful blog surrounding MFA and 2FA scams that might support you.

3.       Protect devices with an endpoint manager

Sure, MFA can act as a barrier between cyber criminals and your apps and devices. But what about the devices themselves? It’s vital that you also protect your employees’ devices so that you have that extra layer of protection in place.

With so many businesses embracing hybrid workstyles today, the loss and theft of devices is more likely than ever, as commuters shift their laptops from the office and back home again more regularly.

An endpoint management solution will enable you to secure and manage all endpoint devices without physically obtaining them. This means that in the case a device falls into the wrong hands, you will have the ability to block access to confidential information and even wipe device memory.

With support from IT security experts, you could implement endpoint management and security tools that will ensure your devices are protected from data breaches.

4.      Quarantine phishing emails

It will come as no surprise that phishing emails are the most common form of data breach, globally! According to worldwide research conducted by APWG,  there was a 15% increase in phishing attacks between 2021 and 2022; recording a total of 1,025,968 phishing attached in the first quarter of 2022.

Fortunately, there are now advanced security tools that can help you detect emails that aren’t from a legitimate sender – and even quarantine them, so that they can’t even reach your inbox without your permission.

If you want to learn more about how to stop phishing emails and attacks in your business, we can help.

5.       Boost your cyber security posture

Data breaches (and all other forms of cyber crime, for that matter) can be a minefield. Our ever-changing technology environments make it impossible for us to keep up with the latest scams.

Luckily, there are experts who specialise in delivering bespoke cyber security services tailored to your business and the threats you may be facing.

At Virtuoso, we offer an advanced range of cyber solutions that support our customers in strengthening their security posture, whilst ensuring they are protected 24-hours a day. Our curated suite of cyber security tools and services are backed by internationally certified processes, to give our customers the peace of mind they need when it comes to their businesses data.

To find out more, or share your cyber worries, get in touch today. We’re waiting to hear from you!