You will have spent a lot of time and potentially a lot of money on your startup. You will have agonized over it, had sleepless nights, worried and finally got to a place where you were ready to start. The last thing you want now is for something to go wrong and to lose everything.
This is why you must protect your startup. Cybercriminals will attack anywhere at any time, and it makes no difference to them whether you are a startup or an established business, whether you are making millions or a few hundred. So it is vital that you protect your startup.
Start with the basics
There are some basic rules when it comes to IT and protecting your business that you will need to adhere to. If you can stick to these, you will make it much easier to protect your business. These include:
- Using strong passwords that you change on a regular basis
- Only opening emails from people you know
- Never clicking on suspicious links – even if it looks like it will take you somewhere official
- Don’t open suspicious attachments
Even if you are spending thousands of dollars on a high-tech security system, hackers will be able to get into your network if these rules are not followed. It is also crucial to ensure that your employees also follow the rules – make it part of their induction process to show them what to look out for.
Encrypt your data
If you can encrypt your data then it will make it much less tempting to thieves. Plus, if they do get hold of it, they will not be able to read the sensitive information.
You may not have the funds to hire someone in house to encrypt all of your data, but there are less expensive solutions available that you can buy to do it yourself. This is certainly better than not doing anything at all and could save you a lot of trouble.
Have a recovery plan
Sometimes the worst can happen – a hacker can get into your system, or you might have a malfunction where computer completely breaks down. In these cases, you could lose everything. If you have a recovery plan in place, the outcome won’t be quite as bad. Firstly, you should make sure that you regularly back everything up; this way you can restore your system and not lose too much data.
You should also have a more robust data protection and security system in place. This is a professional service that will ensure nothing is lost, even if it seems as though it is. If your backup
Use the Cloud
Whenever possible, it’s best to use the cloud for storage, and for backups. This is by far the safest way to keep your data protected, plus it means that you can work from anywhere as long as you have an internet connection and the right login details.
The cloud is an inexpensive way to keep your data safe and cyber criminals won’t be able to get to it.
