Small Business Identity Records Now Target #1 For Hackers
Across the board, small businesses tend to have easier security to crack than their larger counterparts. This has been true for almost as long as the internet has been available, but hackers have historically tended to focus on the bigger targets due to the ratio of effort and risk to reward.
While larger businesses have been hardening their defenses, smaller businesses have had a tendency to believe that they are beneath the radar of hackers. This happens with troubling frequency even when that particular business has suffered a data breach in the past.
The relative ease of attacking a smaller business has become such that it’s now perceived as being worth a hacker’s time and effort in more cases – particularly when smaller businesses don’t patch out known vulnerabilities that hackers can use automated tools to quickly scan for and exploit.
The data profiles that cyber criminals trade in the underground have also become much like the far-ranging identity records that the giant tech companies gather. Identity thieves are scooping up as much personal data as possible to facilitate identity theft and financial fraud, which makes the contents of a home network or the files of a small business more valuable as supplementary additions.
Changes needed to protect identity records
It’s imperative that small businesses recognize how attractive they now are to cyber criminals, and take appropriate measures to protect themselves from a data breach.
While the ideal would be for all companies to have a dedicated cyber security consultant or internal team, the hard reality is that this just isn’t in the budget for very small businesses. Risk profiles also do vary by industry, and some industries are more vulnerable than others and need to devote more resources to security.
It simply makes sense for smaller businesses to devote handling of identity records to third-party services.Even companies on a shoestring budget need to recognize that they are more appealing and more vulnerable to hackers than they have ever been in the past, and every company should have at least some basic policies and practices in place.#Smartstartshere
The relative ease of attacking a smaller business has become such that it's now perceived as being worth the time and effort of #cybercriminals in more cases.
#scantronTechnologysolutions #smartstartshere #askrae