How To Protect Your Business Against Data Leaks

It doesn’t matter whether you have a little side hustle going on, are a small work from home business or a huge multinational company, you are more than likely collecting customer data, and data about your own company and anyone working for you or supplying goods and services to you. It is essential that you do everything in your power to protect your data, as any leaks can be a massive problem for you, your customers, and your business. It is even more critical since the introduction of the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulations) in the EU in May 2018, as if you trade or do custom at all in the EU, you can be liable for fines up to £10, 000 PER BREACH of data. To stop you from falling foul of the rules and to protect both you and your customers, here are some practical steps that you can take.

Assess your risk

You are probably used to doing risk assessments in your business, but you are more than likely missing data off them. You should spend some time working out just how at risk your company is. For example, are hackers likely to be a big problem, or are you more likely to be attacked by malicious software and viruses embedded sneakily in emails? Do you have valuable intellectual property that is very attractive to devious competitors, who are likely to stoop to something low to access it? Of course, you should be doing everything to protect against every possible risk that there is, but if you are more likely to fall victim to a particular form of attack, it is worth taking extra precautions there.

Decide Which Data Needs to Be Kept Safe

Of course, all data should be kept safe, but some are more important than others. For example, customer contact details, payment information, financial records, and any sensitive business practices need to be protected as fully as possible. As well as protecting against outside sources, you also should be doing a regular data backup in case of IT failure - the last thing you want is to lose everything because your computer blows up.

Protect Your Network

One of the easiest ways for your data to fall into the wrong hands is through an unsecured network, especially if you are working from home. Make sure that every device used to access business information has malware installed, that you have a VPN activated, and that everything is updated regularly, to stop any would-be hackers getting in through the gaps. 

Change Passwords Regularly

While it can be annoying to change and remember new passwords regularly, it is important. Lax password security is one of the easiest ways for someone to get into accounts and access data, so build changing your password regularly into your routine. Don't make it easy either - a combination of letters, numbers, and special characters make them much harder to guess and never write them down anywhere.

Making and keeping your data secure can be challenging but important.