2015 saw a significant increase in high-profile hacking attacks in organizations of all disciplines: healthcare, government, and even large entertainment companies all fell victim to data breaches. In light of these attacks, valuable lessons can be learned through analyzing the types of records that were stolen. In 2015, over half of all records exposed to hackers were passwords and email addresses.
Consider the importance of these credentials; they’re used for accessing online accounts and job-critical information that’s stored on company networks. When hackers and thieves gain access to them, they acquire unrestricted access to accounts that may be critical to the functionality of your business.
In addition, many users use the same passwords and usernames across multiple accounts, guaranteeing hackers a lot of access.
Here are some startling statistics revealed by the Risk Based Security report:
In 2015, there were 4,000 reported data breaches, which exposed 736 million records.
40.5 percent of reported incidents occurred in organizations within the United States, while the amount of data stolen actually tallying to around 65 percent of all data stolen throughout the entire year.
238 million stolen data records came from just four huge data breaches.
142 organizations experienced multiple data breaches in 2015.
The US and UK combined made up 45 percent of all reported data breaches in 2015.
What Can I Do About It?!
Well if you want to keep your business safe from the seemingly endless horde of malware on the Internet, you need to be tirelessly working toward integrating proactive security solutions designed to protect your network from potential threats. One way that you can do so is by implementing powerful security measures that are designed to both prevent threats from accessing your network, and detect them from within before they cause unspoken amounts of damage. Enterprise-level firewall and antivirus solutions are great tools meant to prevent breaches, while content filtering and spam blocking solutions make your network even more resilient.
Wow, that a mouthful, but with good reason; these four technologies are what’s known as a Unified Threat Management solution, and it’s a critical investment for any security-minded SMB. And therefore critical for you!
Maybe a little less complex way of mitigating the danger would be using complex passwords that are difficult to guess, and to change these passwords consistently. Your passwords should always be long, utilizing lower and upper-case letters, numbers, and symbols. Remember never use the same password and usernames for multiple online accounts. Always use different credentials. If you have trouble remembering everything, an enterprise-level password manager (like LastPass) is a great way to securely store your credentials online.
In the end, it comes down to how well you protect your organization from threats. But don’t go at it alone, Protek Support has professional technicians that guard your business day in and day out. Keeping complex passwords is a no brainer, but implementing a surefire Unified Threat Management solution can be a daunting task. Let us educate your business on security best practices, while assisting you with the implementation of comprehensive security systems. Our solutions are designed to minimize the chances of data breaches, and to immediately resolve problems that might arise.
Here at Protek we are committed to staying up to date with all the latest security developments in Science and Technology. Staying up to date is a key factor in providing the best Security a Managed services Provider can. If you’d like to learn more about our services, or simply why we are Utah’s number one Managed Services Provider see here or Contact us any time.