Cybersecurity on the Front Seat for Small To Medium-Sized Businesses

With the rapid advancement in the cyber world, cyber threats are also becoming imperative. Cybersecurity has become one of the critical sectors that companies are investing in. The companies and businesses, irrespective of their scale of operation, are prone to the prevalent cyber threats today.

The number and extent of attacks have seen a rise, especially in the current pandemic all over the world. It is typically assumed that small and medium businesses, often referred to as SMBs, are less involved in the security scenario than their larger counterparts. However, CISCO’sCISCO’s recent report proves this assumption wrong with the survey they conducted with over 500 SMBs. 

The company surveyed the enterprises having a workforce of 250-499 people under SMBs and anything beyond that as large enterprises. Cisco is a security company that caters to the security needs of small businesses. 

The statistics presented in the report analyze the security posture of SMBs from different aspects and on comparison yields that small enterprises are as concerned with their security infrastructure as large enterprises. 

The report summarises the efforts that the SMBs put into their security posture. They not only employ separate personnel for the department but take data privacy seriously. 

The SMBs are working for the security issues relentlessly and have improved as per the current data compared to CISCO’sCISCO’s other survey in 2018, but there is still room for improvement. Other than the usual difficulties that most small or medium businesses face, the security issue needs exclusive attention. 

Remote Workforce Management

According to some reports, most cyberattacks happen from outside the businesses, and human resources are often compromised for the successful implementation of the attacks using various types of social engineering attacks. 

The unawareness on the part of the employees can lead to severe data breaches, and the problem has become more relevant in the pandemic due to the remote management of the workforce. It has strained the IT department’s workload and the security teams in ensuring a safer work environment. 

Thus, the present situation demands measures that involve informing the employees and making them more aware of how they can prevent leaving their firms vulnerable. Their involvement in the security strategy is as significant as their other job roles. Therefore, the security guidelines need to incline with the employees’employees’ conduct instead of being complex and problematic. The need of the hour is to switch to measures that provide maximum flexibility to the organization. 

Disaster Management

In case the breach has happened, effective disaster management in terms of reduced downtime is another suggested measure to make the security structure more relevant. This involves keeping up to date with the latest technology and infrastructure needs and regular software updates.

Security Vendors

The SMBs are already burdened with a lot of constraints, and adding to it is the extra burden of security management. The situation suggests involving third-party security vendors to get off some load of it. Adaptability can also concur as an important feature to cope up with the security threats that these organizations face. 

Overall, it can be said that SMBs are not overlooking their cybersecurity, and there is scope for growth and improvement by employing the right methodologies suiting to the organization’s working and structure.