Basic Protection Tips for Client Data

Online security is more important than ever in this day and age. Cybercrime is on the rise. 72% of British consumers are concerned about the safety of their personal data. Your business needs to prioritise using secure communication methods in every aspect of their digital work to protect client data.

This is essential when storing and sharing high net worth client data with team members and business partners. Ensure that your client data is secure by following these steps. Read on for our essential protection tips.

Firewalls

These days, you must have a Firewall. These sit between your network and the outside world and help prevent unwanted access. To get complete security you also need to protect against attacks and viruses etc. However, today’s attacks are much more intelligent. Simply installing firewalls will not be enough to protect you.

Are your firewalls running these additional layers of protection? Don’t know or if you don’t have this added protection? Get in touch with us to discuss.

Self Hosting

Businesses use cloud services to reduce costs. This can come at the expense of an added security risk due to your data and services being hosted on a third party’s infrastructure.

Cloud/hosting providers are also at risk from targeted attacks and to requests for information/data from law enforcement agencies, despite their best efforts. If you run your own dedicated infrastructure you will have total control over your network and data.

If your cloud hosting/provider suffered an attack or loss of your data, would you know?

Patches and Updates

You should ensure that your operating system, applications and hardware are kept up to date.

Make sure that your company is not taking unnecessary risks. Carry out crucial, timely and regular updates. Many businesses could have avoided security breaches entirely if they had simply deployed the latest security patches.

Don’t leave your company open to preventable cyber-attacks! Remember to update your system and fix known security holes.

When was your system last updated? Do you have a patch schedule/management system in place?

Encrypting Client Data

You should encrypt all sensitive data in both transit and rest. Encrypt your servers, laptops, mobile and usb keys etc to prevent a data leak if lost or stolen.

Encrypt all data when moving it (whether it be data to/from a cloud application) and encrypt it end to end so attackers cannot view the data during transit.

Do you know for sure that your data is safe and has not been leaked?

Control Removable Devices

Put a device management strategy in place to stop personally identifiable information and intellectual property from getting out of the office. You should vet any removable devices to avoid both data loss and the introduction of viruses. This may be a company owned/managed device or even an employee’s own laptop/mobile.

If a company device was lost or an employee’s own device was connecting to your network, would you know?

Additional Login Protection

Guidance for password protection varies considerably. Many companies fall short when it comes to password protection.

Forcing employees to create their own complicated passwords, can easily backfire. Employees often generate a single complex password that they can memorise and use across their company logins.

This can lead to a weak point in the system, as just one compromised password can grant access to different systems and services. Businesses can avoid the problem by using multi-factor authentication to add a layer of added security for logging in. This can be in the form of a usb token or a mobile app.

Do your staff use the same password for non-work accounts? Do you use additional security to log in to your applications/resources?

Proper Training

You should implement a data protection policy for employees to follow. The policy needs to outline all the steps that users need to take to keep client information secure.

Train your staff in basic digital security as a key part of any data protection strategy. You should make your employees aware of the dangers of opening unsolicited emails (particularly those with attachments or external links). They should also know what to do if they spot suspicious activity.

Could your employee be able to spot a phishing attack? Is there a process in place to allow employees to report a data breach?

Follow these essential tips to lay a strong foundation for protecting your clients data. You can do even more to safeguard confidential information. Get in touch with our experienced team for personalised expert advice on how you can improve your company’s security.

• Tags:
• client data
• cyber crime
• login protection
• online security