Do You Know How Safe Your Data Is?

Published in

Marketing And Growth Hacking

6 min readMar 25, 2019

Digitalization has saved us from drowning in paper documents, files, and other physical data clutter.

Besides that, U.S. companies spend $25–35 billion on storing, filing, and retrieving paper-based data, which means that going digital and paperless results in huge savings.

But, before you decide to transfer all your important documents and customer data to a cloud or server, you should have a plan on how to keep all that sensitive information safe.

Cybercrime is a serious threat to the safety of your business, and even some big, multi-billion dollar companies have fallen victim to ruthless hackers and their attacks.

Yahoo is still reeling from the 2017 data breach which compromised the information of its three billion users.

Such an incident hits small businesses even harder, given that more than 60% of those affected by a cyber attack fold within six months.

Here’s how to keep malicious threats at bay and protect your company.

Update Your Software Regularly

It’s ironic how such a simple, commonsensical step can

Cybercriminals are working all around the clock to find different system vulnerabilities and security holes in software in order to smuggle their malicious codes.

If you’re not installing critical updates regularly, you won’t get security patches which can protect your data. To prevent this from happening, schedule automatic updates.

An even more important thing is installing and regularly updating your antivirus software as it’s your first line of defense against the bad guys.

All this is particularly important if you sell something online collect your customers’ credit card numbers and similar sensitive data. Outdated software and the lack of a reliable antivirus program, you’re practically leaving open the backdoor through which all the data can be easily stolen.

Switch to HTTPS

Migrating to HTTPS is a must if you want to keep up with the latest security standards.

This protocol creates a safe connection between your website and your users’ browsers, which means that the transmission of data is encrypted. In other words, even if cyber criminals intercept the data you exchange with your users, they won’t be able to decipher it.

Although HTTPS should be a must given that it’s extremely easy to hack an HTTP website, only about 50% of top 1 million websites have upped their security game and switched to this advanced protocol.

Besides protecting your and your customers’ data, which should be your primary concern, migrating to HTTPs has some other benefits.

For example, Google Chrome marks HTTP websites as not secure and alerts visitors about that, which can have a significant impact on traffic and engagement.

HTTPS is also a ranking signal, and although it’s a mild one, sticking to the obsolete HTTP will certainly remove you from Google’s good books — so if you still don’t have an SSL certificate, the time has come to get one.

Use Strong Passwords

This should be common sense, but it apparently isn’t, as many people use weak passwords that can be easily cracked.

For example, it’s a terrible idea to use your birthday or your kid’s name as a password, as such information is easily accessible online.

Similarly, using the same password for multiple accounts means that if it’s compromised, each of those accounts is at risk.

Also, don’t forget to change all the relevant passwords after an employee leaves.

It’s crucial to educate your employees about this and ensure that they follow the guidelines.

Implement Two-Factor Authentication

Cybersecurity statistics say that small businesses are the targets of 43% of cyber attacks, and it’s essential to take all measures possible to ward off potential danger.

2FA adds an extra layer of security to your and your customers’ accounts.

The regular, username + password combination is a single-factor authentication, and it doesn’t have what it takes to keep all the sensitive data your website collects safe and protected.

With two-factor authentication, your customers will have to provide additional information to verify their identity when logging onto your website. It can be the answer to a predefined question or a fingertip scan.

Apart from strengthening the login security on your website, this kind of authentication also makes your customers more comfortable when it comes to trust you with their credit card numbers and other sensitive information.

Back Up Your Data

No protection measure can guarantee 100% protection, which is why it’s best to use multiple tactics to make it as complicated for potential hackers to break into your system and compromise your information.

That’s why it’s wise to back up your data so that you can easily retrieve it in case of an attack or any other incident.

For example, your website might be hacked and rendered inaccessible, leaving you without all your valuable business documents and records. Having a backup copy can save the day, as well as your time and money you’d otherwise spend while trying to retrieve the lost data necessary for getting back in business.

Avoid File Uploads

Although allowing your customers to upload their files to your website is a useful functionality, it’s a huge security risk.

Almost every type of file can be laced with malicious code, which could wreak havoc on your system once it’s uploaded and executed.

Even a seemingly innocent avatar image file contains a comment section in which a malicious PHP code can be smuggled.

One of the ways to stay on the safe side is preventing users from executing files they upload, but it’s even better to restrict access to the uploaded files altogether.

Dispose of Data Safely

Just like you don’t simply throw your important documents in the trash without shredding them first, you also shouldn’t get rid of your old equipment recklessly.

You should be particularly careful when it comes to hard disks as they’re packed with different information and maybe even passwords that can be retrieved from them even after they have been formatted.

Use the degaussing process, which demagnetizes a disk drive thus rendering it useful, and destroy it with the help of a hard-disk shredder.

Many businesses and individuals neglect the importance of securing their online data, despite numerous security leaks and incidents. So, be wiser than that if you don’t want to become a statistic in cyber security reports.