Secure business data when working from home
It’s very important that moving to the hybrid working environment era businesses take note of the security considerations needed to protect business data.
One of the biggest challenges businesses face in the fast-changing world of technology is the constant need to adapt to new security threats. Cyber threats have increased during the pandemic due to increased vulnerabilities in business systems, staff home working and hacking techniques targeting user credentials to access valuable business data.
Working from home is here to stay. The question business owners and management should be asking is whether company data is secure and protected on home network environments outside the companies control, which can be a headache from a security and compliance perspective.
There are a number of security solutions that can help businesses control and secure business user devices when outside of the office, such as DNS filtering applications and enabling website traffic control on user devices to block harmful or dangerous threats from websites which traditional an office network firewall would have blocked.
We recommend two factor authentication (2FA) on all cloud based systems to protect from unauthorised access to business systems. Permisisons and administration privileges should be reviewed for restricted business information or control users abaility to install applications on business devices.
There has been an increase in conducting cyber essentials certifications for new and existing clients due to new regulations when working with government or public sector organisations. The cyber essentials reviews are highly beneficial and allows businesses to analyse the network, device security and information governance.
As the work life balance changes and companies embrace hybrid working, we have been advising clients to start thinking about implementing home working policies (HOS) to further secure company devices and information. These type of policies help management outline clear guidelines on usage and governance needed to monitor user productivity, device behaviour and information security whilst working from home.
Home working over the pandemic was aided by VPNs, Microsoft SharePoint, Dropbox, remote access software (TeamViewer or Splashtop) or hosted desktop systems. As things return to normal, it is important to take the time to review access rights to these systems to decide which members of staff still require access remotely.
Blog Author – Jonathon Blanks – Technical Director
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