Security In The Time Of Covid

Why is Security so Important Right Now?

Businesses are currently experiencing a new digital era of working – an era that’s presence has arguably been foregrounded by the coronavirus pandemic and the consequent rise in remote working. With this modern iteration of digital business comes a number of concerns: how to improve agility, automation, collaboration, data access and more. But whether you’re embracing a cloud or hybrid solution there is one factor that’s value cannot be overstated. Security. With organisations seeing a sudden move to remote working followed by partial return to office, IT managers are left trying to support a variety of working cases and ensure security whilst potentially working remotely themselves. On top of this, alongside the rise of Covid we have seen a rise in cybercrime, adding yet another weight to the shoulders of those managers. The peace of mind a reliable security solution can provide is truly invaluable.

A Wolf in Sheep’s clothing?

Security attacks and Internal leaks You could argue that security has always been invaluable to a business and this is absolutely true, so why stress the need for digital security now? Alongside the notable rise in cybercrime, it is important to also acknowledge the sophistication of cybercrime currently. If organisations like Twitter, Garmin and Teesside Council can get caught out, there’s nothing to say that this couldn’t happen to an organisation of any shape or size. The biggest increase in cyber-attacks during lockdown has been in spear phishing attacks. Spear phishing is the malicious sending of emails seemingly from a trusted sender in order to convince employees to provide access and reveal confidential information. Whilst many users are now clued in enough to know not to open an email with a strange subject from an unknown sender, they are still likely to open an email that appears to be from Tim in accounting – Why wouldn’t they? So preventing these attacks is vital. Yet another stressor? When it comes to security, Synergi’s mission statement is simple: prevention over cure. By investing in appropriate security tools not only do you majorly reduce the risk of a successful cyber-attack, you also offer peace of mind to both users and managers. Ultimately implementing a digital security solution is a lot less stressful and a lot more affordable than having to deal with the aftermath of a data leak. So how do you implement a successful security solution? Each organisation will have its own idiosyncrasies so be sure to conduct a thorough cybersecurity audit of your business and use your findings to inform not only your preventative solution choices but your education and training of users. It’s imperative that all users are educated on how to work securely and that this training builds from the basics up. A useful exercise to implement is a security drill in which you periodically run a spoof phishing campaign, simulating a potential threat to security. This exercise will highlight which employees are still in need of training and guidance, ensuring that your organisation is always maintaining an informed and secure position. What if the worst does happen?

It’s vital to be able to rely on a readily available and fully tested backup and disaster recovery strategy aligned to your business recovery point and time objectives (RPO and RTO). These should be defined per service or application that you need to recover. Not sure where to start? That’s where a managed service provider comes in.