Don't leave the keys lying around....

Working from home – or at home working – however you like to look at it, it’s what we’re doing right now. For many I’ve spoken to, it’s working better than they imagined and who knows, this might be the catalyst for organisations to embrace workstyle flexibility for their people.

This is written from the perspective of being encouraging – it’s all pretty do-able. You really just need to have “plain English” conversations with the IT professionals internal or external to your business to get things happening – safely. 

When chatting to our clients one of the subjects that keeps coming up, is ensuring their people, both existing and new, have got the right tools to do their jobs remotely – and this includes ensuring the IT is sorted – and that’s more than just making sure they have a remote login. Now is not the time for your cyber and business security to take a back seat.

Our team’s fully equipped to work remotely, and as a business owner I know it’s imperative to ensure that we apply the same protocols to our people’s home operations as we do in the office. There’s more to it than dishing out a laptop – we need to take responsibility for the protocols that should go with that. 

There’s plenty of websites, posts and specialists out there offering advice and action, and while this isn’t a substitute for specialist advice, as a business owner I think there are some basic principles to consider within an organisation’s cyber strategy with your people working from home:

1.      Computer security

2.      System and transmission security

3.      Hardcopy security

4.      Common sense.

 Some of the things you might need to consider within these principles:

1.      Computer security – what hardware are your people using – is it yours or theirs? Do they have adequate virus/malware protection? Is it up to date? Is their software up to date? Ensure this is checked and timetabled.

 2.      System and transmission security – keep up your normal protocols including enforcing strong complex passwords and password expiry. Give people access to only what they need access to and diarise to audit this. If you’re internally hosted, only allow remote access over VPN. Don’t allow local hard discs, removeable drives etc from getting mapped via remote connection.

 Some organisations and government agencies might align themselves with a national standard (nzism.gcsb.govt.nz).

 When using team communication tools like Zoom, ensure the settings aren’t “public”. 

 3.      Hardcopy security – remind your people to be vigilant with the papers they have with them and to keep them together and secure. You must take steps to respect data and privacy. One day this lockdown will be over and you may invite the neighbours round – and you wouldn’t want them to find your company’s or your customers, financials or strategy on the coffee table.

4.      Common sense – let’s not forget the usual stuff when we’re working remotely – don’t give out passwords, don’t use the same passwords, create complex strong passwords, don’t copy data, and don’t click on that link in that email from the person you don’t know or weren’t expecting!

As a business owner I know we can’t rest on our laurels with our cyber, data and privacy security when working from home, just the same as we wouldn’t when we’re in the office. We agenda cyber security, along with health and safety, in every team meeting and don’t just give it lip service but take the opportunity to update staff but also discuss any issues, trends, bad habits etc, ensuring everyone is on the same page.

Making sure our systems are secure and our people act appropriately is critical at the best of times – and we shouldn’t let it slip during these unusual times.

As our IT Specialist likes to say – “we don’t leave our home front door open or all the keys lying around” – and your business data, intelligence and security is no different. 

A big thanks to our IT expert @aaronmiddlemiss and inhouse comms expert https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/jacaleen-williams-25a2b1171/ for their input and help!