10 Most Common Cybersecurity Mistakes You Should Avoid

Well, there is no dearth of doubt in the fact that it is an organization’s objective to ensure the privacy and confidentiality of their business data. And, since cyber attacks are on the rise, cybersecurity has become the talk of the business world. Once the attackers are able to retrieve sensitive business data, they can cause you loss of money, data, and reputation. 

Since almost every business has started relying on technology, malicious cyber attacks have upped their game to exploit an organization’s weaknesses in their IT infrastructure. 

Hence, it has become really crucial for organizations to strengthen their security controls and practice good cybersecurity hygiene. Though every organization is working to protect their sensitive data from cyber threats yet there are some common mistakes that a business should avoid: 

Common Cybersecurity Mistakes That Make Your Business Data Vulnerable 

According to a report, 58% of malware attacks are directed at small businesses. Hence, if the security in your small business is just a padlock on your front door, you might want to amplify your cybersecurity practices. 

There is no one-size-fits-all cybersecurity strategy for businesses. An IT Manager needs to understand their organization’s security challenges and loopholes before working on the cybersecurity strategy. 

Here are 10 common cybersecurity mistakes that you should avoid while deploying a cybersecurity strategy:  

Multi-Factor Authentication Not Enforced 

For keeping accounts safe and secure, multi-factor authentication is a sure-shot method to ward off credential-stealing attacks. It forces anyone logging in to produce another form of authentication and it is quite effective Remote Desktop Protocol. 

The multi-factor authentication does not let an attacker take control of your systems and curbs the chances of ransomware and phishing attacks. 

An MFA (multi-faceted authentication) works as follows: 

• Two-factor authentication or two-step authentication – Just the password and another ID
• Authenticator verifies the user’s identity with the help of a password 

• At the time of account registration, a user enters biometric information by scanning the retina, fingerprints, or any other body part. 

Adaptive multi-factored authentication balances security information with the user experience by: 

• Number of failed login attempts
• Geographical location of the user
• Geo-velocity or the physical distance between consecutive login attempts
• A device being used for login
• Day and time of login attempt
• Operating system
• Source IP address
• User role

Not Having a Disaster Recovery Plan

Well, you might know when a cyber attack is going to happen, hence, the major blunder that you can do is not having a disaster recovery plan. 

We understand that blocking unauthorized access, blocking malware, closing ports or exchange servers, changing passwords, firewall filtering, and on and on becomes overwhelming for you. Also, these processes can’t be implemented in a matter of a few minutes. 

Setting up alternative arrangements when your business is hit by a cyber attack or a breach happens is inevitable. This allows your business continuity without any downtime and your employees can go on as usual. While your IT team can work on rectifying the issue. 

Believing Breaches Are Big Events

Well, Cyberattacks are not that big of an event for the attackers. They target businesses at a very small scale and sometimes, if your IT department is not vigilant enough, these attacks may go unnoticed. 

Cyber attacks are hard to spot and it is even harder to tell what was compromised if security measures are not in place. Traditional security measures are designed in a way to spot bigger cyber attack events. The issue here is small cyber-attacks may go longer and slowly exfiltrate data. 

Continuous and comprehensive monitoring is the best way to deter these small attacks. The use of AI tools helps in detecting unusual patterns and informing the IT team to take action before it’s too late. 

No Cyber Awareness Programs for Employees 

There is no denying the fact that it is the responsibility of an organization to educate its employees on common cyber attacks and the measures to avoid them. No matter how robust your security policies are, if your employees are not educated, your organization is at risk. 

The most common attack is a phishing attack where a person pretends to be a trusted contact and he sends an email with a malicious link and encourages the employees to download it. Once the employee downloads, it gives the hacker access to all business data. 

Malware and Phishing attacks are quite common and it is very easy to fall prey to them if your organization’s employees are not trained. Downloading from an untrusted website, clicking on spam emails, or connecting with an infected device is something every employee should avoid. 

Here are some of the things you can recommend to your employees: 

• Creating strong one-time access passwords 
• Changing passwords regularly 
• Focusing on email security 
• Using updated software at all times
• Ignoring email attachments from untrusted senders 
• Not trusting public Wi-Fi 
• Not using default security software 

The onus of building a strong culture of business security in your organization lies on you! 

No Cyber Security Policy In Your Organisation 

According to Astra Security, there are 2200 cyber attacks per day and that means there is an attack happening every 39 seconds. 

Despite the risk, there are businesses that disregard the importance of a cybersecurity policy in their organizations. A cybersecurity policy keeps you and your employees on board with the security measures and helps identify threats keeping the firm’s data protected. 

Not only this, a policy helps set the parameters of cybersecurity culture in your organization. You can guide your employees about social media use, personal device use, and password sharing in your organization to help them be cyber aware. 

Not Securing Your Business Data 

Despite being repeatedly asked, some businesses do not focus on data protection. Their ignorance costs permanent loss of data plus it costs a fortune for data recovery after a breach though getting back the complete data is still doubtful. 

While backing up data regularly is one way to create another lifeline for your organization, however, it is absolutely necessary to take cybersecurity measures to secure your business data. 

Here are some of the methods that help in securing your data: 

• Data backup
• Encryption
• Secure disposal of data
• Monitoring endpoints and personal device use
• Cloud usage
• Data access control

Encrypting your data might be the catch as it turns your entire data into complex codes which are impossible to read. Investing in cloud software is a big relief if you wish to protect your data without much of a hassle. 

Becoming A Do It All Yourself 

If you are solely responsible for your business’s entire IT network, then my friend, you are making a huge mistake. It shows that you are underestimating cyber threats that can harm your business. 

Okay, We agree that if you are a trained expert and it is your primary role in your business, it is quite impossible to manage everything alone. Investing in the most advanced tech becomes fatal if you do not have a cybersecurity plan. 

According to experts, it is crucial to hire a professional IT team that has the knowledge, resources, and experience to manage your company’s cybersecurity efficiently.

As our technology advances, cyber threats advance each day. If you want to stay ahead of the game and run your business with peace of mind, hiring a professional cybersecurity expert is recommended. 

Poor Endpoint Detection and Response

According to CISA, hackers have upped their game and have found new ways to pose a threat to your business and its data. 

There is a rise in the usage of obfuscated malicious scripts and PowerShell attacks that bypass the endpoint security controls making it difficult for the admins to detect the hackers. Not only this, usage of certain scanning tools to find open ports acts as an initial access vector has become a commonly posed threat for businesses around the globe. 

Investing in updated EDR policies is a must for businesses in order to level up their security game. It provides businesses with: 

• Endpoint visibility 
• Threat database
• Behavioral protection 
• Insight and Intelligence
• Rapid response
• Cloud-based solution 

An endpoint-based defense solution implements greater security and helps in the identification and response to these cyber threats. 

Unprotected and Misconfigured Cloud Services 

While most organizations have switched most of their work online, cloud systems have become the most targeted entity for hackers. According to Gartner, 60% of organizations have moved towards cloud systems. 

Unprotected and misconfigured cloud services lead to data theft and cryptojacking. Any glitches, gaps, or errors expose your business to multiple risks during cloud adoption. Security breaches, external hackers, ransomware, malware, or insider threats are some of the common threats that might harm your business. 

Automating security, configuration checks, and cybersecurity risk assessment on a regular basis surely helps your business keep the attackers at bay. 

Vendor- Supplied Default configurations and Default Credentials 

An organization deploys a lot of hardware and software solutions to make its work smoother and more efficient. In order to make the product user-friendly, these solutions come with default passwords, configurations, and usernames.

These default settings in your systems make your business prone to cyber-attacks if they are not reset and made more secure after a successful deployment. 

In order to make your setup easier, sometimes, many of the admins use default administrator credentials. Such as ‘admin’ for both username and password and this is not hard to guess for a hacker. 

Final Words 

We know that ‘To err is human’, but when it comes to your business security, these errors might be fatal. 

Ensuring that your organization and the employees are not repeating the aforementioned cybersecurity mistakes becomes your prime duty. 

If you are unsure of how you can amp up your security game, it is better to get help from a professional to reduce the chances of a cyberattack. 

Prevent cyber-attacks and meet compliance objectives with Visiontech’s Cyber security-certified experts.