Nowadays, it seems as though not enough businesses take their cybersecurity as seriously as they should. Top companies are constantly emailing consumers about data breaches, popular sites are prone to hacking attempts, and businesses are suffering reputation damages because of improperly altered content left unchecked on their websites. While you can underestimate the value of quality cybersecurity, not protecting your company can lead to many consequences.
The truth about cyber attacks
It’s easy to think your business is immune to a cyber attack if you’ve never had to deal with one. However, if you do fall victim to a cyber attack, you’ll wish you had set up proper protection to prevent it from ever happening in the first place. In fact, in 2017 alone, it’s estimated that businesses were targeted by upwards of 160,000 unique cyber attacks, 93% of which were preventable if those businesses were properly secured. At the end of the day, an attack is more likely than you think.
Commonly, if someone has gained access to your website and is mucking about with your content and your code, they acquired logins from phishing attempts or brute force methods. Email phishing scams are incredibly common and affect a wide amount of businesses across the world. If you’re unfamiliar with phishing scams, chances are you don’t need to look much further than your own inbox. That’s how prevalent they are.
Keep an eye on your content
Unless you’ve set up alerts to notify you when someone logs into your site from an unusual area, you may not even know that there’s someone in your back end manipulating your content. If the login is a result of a successful phishing scam or brute force attempt, it’ll simply appear as though one of your employees accessed the site and nothing will particularly look irregular until the damage is already done.
This is where a website content monitor comes in handy. These tools are able to alert you to any changes to your content and are triggered by the presence (or even the absence) of certain keywords, and are typically further customizable. It’s a great way to know what’s taking place on your site without you constantly needing to refresh each page and manually review it. While a content monitor is a great first step, it’s only one piece of a much larger security puzzle.
Securing your site
There are plenty of tools you should utilize to ensure you’re not suffering from the reputation damages associated with altered content and code. Prevent someone from tampering with your website in the first place by investing in quality cybersecurity software or contracting a security agency to handle protection for you. Simply having a basic firewall in place is no longer an effective means of preventing a cyber attack—if it ever was.
Often, security companies are your best bet as they’re able to custom-tailor solutions that fit your business’s unique needs. Whether this is training your staff on how to spot and combat common cyber attacks or helping your tech department set up a secured network, a quality security company is a great ally to have in your corner when defending your website—and your reputation—from the harm cyber attacks cause.
Staying safe online
Whether you’re interested in a DIY solution or you want to leave your security in the hands of professionals, it’s important to act quickly. Establishing your security system and making sure it’s effective is the first step in defending your business. Don’t wait until it’s too late to implement a security system. You’ll only end up regretting it.
