WHAT ARE THE MOST COMMON CYBERSECURITY RISKS EVERY BUSINESS OWNER MUST KNOW?

There are a variety of cybersecurity risks that individuals and organizations may face. Some of the most significant cybersecurity risks include:

1. Phishing attacks: These are fraudulent attempts to obtain sensitive information, such as login credentials or credit card details, by posing as a trustworthy entity in an email, text message, or phone call.
2. Malware: Malware is any software designed to harm a computer system, network, or device. Malware can come in various forms, such as viruses, worms, trojan horses, ransomware, spyware, and adware.
3. Social engineering: Social engineering is a type of cyber-attack that relies on manipulating individuals to divulge confidential information or perform actions that could jeopardize a company’s security.
4. Insider threats: Insider threats occur when someone within an organization intentionally or accidentally causes harm to the company’s security. This could include employees or contractors who have access to sensitive data and systems.
5. DDoS attacks: A distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack occurs when an attacker floods a website or server with traffic to overload it, causing it to crash and become unavailable.
6. Zero-day exploits: Zero-day exploits refer to security vulnerabilities in software or hardware that are not yet known to the vendor or have not yet been patched. Hackers can exploit these vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access to systems or steal data.
7. Third-party risks: Third-party risks arise when an organization’s suppliers, vendors, or partners are not adequately protecting their data or systems. This can result in data breaches, supply chain attacks, or other forms of cyber-attacks.
8. Cloud security: With the increasing use of cloud services, there is a risk of data breaches, unauthorized access, or data loss due to misconfigured cloud services, insecure APIs, or insufficient access controls.
9. IoT security: As the number of Internet of Things (IoT) devices continues to grow, there is a risk of cyber-attacks on these devices, which could cause disruptions, data breaches, or physical harm.
10. Cyber espionage: Cyber espionage refers to the theft of sensitive information or intellectual property by foreign governments or other entities. This can lead to significant economic and national security consequences.

We know that as business owners, this list seems overwhelming – it seemed overwhelming to us as well.  A most common path but a very dangerous one is simply to ignore the situation as a hopeless one.  That is the last thing you should do.  What we recommend is to do what we did in our own business and for many of our customers – conduct a cybersecurity assessment.  This assessment will help identify the areas to focus on to keep the “bad actors” out of your business.

Bring in the expert cybersecurity team at nQuery for an initial complimentary consultation on how we can help keep your business mitigate cybersecurity risks. Contact us at 305-910-2324 or info@nquerycommunications.com