45% of the United States companies become the data breach victim.

We are sure you wouldn’t want to be the next victim, right? Thus, you need to ensure that your data is well protected to reduce the risk of theft and fraud.

Today’s article will explore 5 security strategies to protect your company from cyber attacks.

Cyber Crimes

Cybercrimes and attacks are among the most common problems in the modern-day world. It poses a high risk to personal and organizational data.

Suppose a cybercriminal hacks a website and accesses the customer’s sensitive data. In that case, it could create a serious problem for the company. Customers can press legal charges for the breach of their private data.

Moreover, the reputation of the company is tainted. Hence, concrete stargazes for data protection are no longer good to have. In fact, they are MUST to have.

Let’s take a look at the 5 security strategies:

5 Security Strategies To Protect Your Company From Cyber Attacks

1. Encrypt Data

Considering encryption as a cyber-defense strategy is a smart move. Cybercriminals target organizations that lack proper cybersecurity procedures. In addition to protecting data from hackers, encryption provides three essential benefits:

• Encrypted messages are much more difficult to intercept and decode.
• They are impossible to reverse engineer.
• Encryption makes your data impossible for cybercriminals to copy or change.
• Encryption helps mitigate ransomware attacks.

Encryption works by scrambling text into unreadable form. Unauthorized people can’t read an encrypted message unless they have the decryption key.

Encryption is essential in the digital age when massive amounts of personal data are stored in cloud storage and on servers connected to the internet. Consequently, encryption plays an integral role in protecting data privacy.

The second strategy to protect data is to:

2. Back-Up Data

It’s vital to back up data to protect your organization against cyberattacks. But a sound backup strategy isn’t enough.

The backups must be secure to reduce the effects of a data compromise and enable you to recover as lost data as possible. Ransomware is a typical example of encrypting data and locking systems.

While paying the ransom may unlock data, it isn’t a guaranteed solution to preventing the cyberattack. And paying a ransom doesn’t always guarantee a decryption tool – it’s also against the advice of cyber agencies and information security specialists. 

The ransomware threat often targets backups and forces the target to pay a ransom.

In the case of CERT-Wavestone, the attacker deleted backups before encrypting the customer’s system. The attacker gained elevated privileges in the Active Directory account that managed backup infrastructure. This allows the attacker to connect to the backup infrastructure and delete all the backed-up data.

Moving on to the 3^rd strategy, which is the most important one:

3. Educate Employees

Educate employees about cybersecurity threats and security strategies as part of the company culture. While simple repetitive tasks can be modeled into automated systems, humans are the company’s backbone. Even automated systems aren’t foolproof; humans are behind emails, chat sessions, and phone calls.

Education is the only natural defense against cyberattacks. By educating employees on security threats and practices, your organization will be more resilient to cyberattacks.

While many companies invest in office-wide technology to protect their networks and data, they don’t spend time educating their employees about cybersecurity best practices. This leads to an increased risk of breaches.

Employees often allow cybercriminals to gain access to company systems and data. According to a 2020 study, 88% of data breaches are caused by human error. 43% of people have made mistakes at work that compromised cybersecurity.

Another way to prevent employees from being targeted by hackers is to make them aware of the various security risks posed by

• Social Media
• Email
• Phishing Sites

Employees should be cautious regarding phishing emails that seem to be genuine but include harmful hyperlinks or attachments. If employees use personal devices for work, they must sign out every time they leave them at home.

Up next, we have:

4. Regular Software Updates

Updating software is essential for cybersecurity. Without updates, your systems are vulnerable to hacking attempts. Many organizations fail to update the software after being warned of vulnerabilities.

Hackers can access information from specific accounts on management systems and controlled desktops by failing to update. They then use this information to cause damage.

In addition to ransomware, software updates also prevent hackers from using previously unknown vulnerabilities. For best results, keep your systems updated.

In addition to protecting your data from cyberattacks, you should perform regular backups of critical data. These backups are vital for your business’s success and prevent any data loss that could threaten it.

Even though you have a security system in place, it’s always better to be safe than sorry. Updating software is essential to prevent cyber attacks and prevent data loss. However, it’s impossible to avoid every attack.

The last strategy on our today’s list is:

5. Avoid Surfing Unsecured Websites

Many organizations are vulnerable to cyberattacks, including those originating from unsecured websites.

Websites that use:

• HTTPS ( Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure )  
• HSTS (Hyper Security Transport Layer Security)

Must adhere to the highest level of security possible to protect their users’ information. The CISA Cyber Insights website provides information about preventing DNS tampering. Moreover, this site outlines how organizations should enforce the principle of least privilege, which is another essential aspect of secure password management.

Many businesses focus on making their websites appealing to users. While this is important, many business owners ignore the security of their websites.

While these issues can cost millions of dollars and ruin a business’s reputation, the security of a website will protect your organization from cyberattacks. Instead of compromising your website’s security, you can make it more secure by following these best practices.

Conclusion

In this digital age, no organization is immune to the threat of cyberattacks. Therefore, organizations must implement a Cyber Security Incident Response Plan (CSIRP). The goal of the CSIRP is to protect organizations from emerging and known threats while preparing them to recover from an attack.

In addition, security threats are evolving, so organizations must update their security network and associated systems to prevent cyberattacks. Backups are vital to minimize the risk of data breaches. Whether your organization is small or large, it is critical to backup. It restores all of your data and files to avoid a cyberattack.

As web applications and cloud solutions revolutionize public administration and business, organizations are more vulnerable to cyber-attacks. Organizations are exposed to increasing cyberattacks, and they can no longer afford to ignore the threat.

Cybercriminals target organizations for valuable data, and every attack can result in a data breach. Cyberattacks have numerous consequences and can cripple an organization.