London businesses are under a constant threat of cyber-attack, and the risk is so advanced that analysts reckon most are at risk of collapse. A CityAM report estimates that more than 1 million small businesses are threatened with permanent closure due to the weight of cyber attacks – fortunately, there are small steps that most can take to ward off the risk. Protecting a physical property is straightforward – alarms, cameras, locks and insurance do a lot of the work. The digital world can seem more foreboding, but there are easy steps to take, and it will protect you and help to grow your business.
Data protection
The first step in protecting your business is one that concerns yours and your customers’ data. The modern business is a data-collecting machine – everything will register a mark, from the name and email address of your customers through to their geodata. A quick glance at the ICO’s list of fines show how severe taking this for granted can be – a GDPR fine, for instance, comes up to £20 million, or 4% of global revenue – whichever is greater. The rules are changing fast, too; a new FCA strategy means that any business regulated by the FCA or Bank of England will have new rules to follow. Fortunately, data protection can be quite simple. It’s a matter of only retaining what you need, and storing business transactions for a set time; using data management software will help to tick many of these boxes.
Cyber security
Having proper data protection policies will prevent cyber attacks from gleaming the most important information they need from your business. It is still, however, better to stop attacks in the first place. As a start, the NCSC recommends using software to protect against malware and phishing attacks. Most services these days have it as a norm – spam filters will filter out many illicit emails. Regardless of that, having a software package that can scale appropriately to your business and keep attacks away is important.
Covering the trail
What about what you do outside of your website? According to The Straits Times, every person has a digital footprint that leaves a trail where they go. This can be laden with data, personal information, or even basic habits. It’s commonplace for employers to check out social media now – up to 70%, according to the report – and the same goes for your business. Being tidy and organised with your data, and ensuring your records are backed up and kept securely, will prevent you from leaving a trail on the web and will show respect for your consumer base and your business itself.
With this protection can come assurance that your data is safe. You will develop a positive reputation, and that can mean a lot – customers are likely to trust such a business more, and authenticity is worth a lot in the modern business world.
