The results of the Commonwealth Government’s 2012 Cyber Crime and Security Survey Report are in, and they’re troubling.
While most businesses are aware of the dangers that cyber crime poses to the integrity of their systems and data, over 20% of Australian businesses still reported a cyber incident in 2012, with some of these businesses reporting as many as 10 or more separate incidents.
In addition to being far more damaging than cyber attacks against individuals and members of the public (One business surveyed indicated that they had lost 15 years’ worth of critical business data), attacks against businesses are usually targeted – more than 50% of the time, according to the respondents.
Attacks against businesses also follow a number of different vectors, such as:
- Device theft through physical break-in
- Data theft through Trojan, virus or rootkit infection
- Breach of confidential information via system penetration (usually via Remote Desktop Protocol)
- Website defacement via ineffective or non-existent web-hosting security policy (ie. WordPress)
- Distributed denial of service (DDoS)
And, although most attacks against businesses came from external sources, we also need to be vigilant against threats from within – as many of 44% originated from within the organisation itself.
But we’re already doing our best – what more can we do?
Properly securing a small to medium-sized business can appear overwhelming.
Like any other complex and multifaceted task, business security needs to be broken down into a number of simple steps and policies that are embraced by the whole business, not just the long-suffering IT department.
Download and distribute AVG’s Small Business Security Guide within your business to educate yourself and your staff on a wide range of IT security mistakes and how to avoid them.
Modern network hardware and software solutions have a multitude of built-in security features, but at the end of the day they’re only as secure as the people who operate and utilise them.
Download the guide for a series of best practices and security policy pointers on passwords and authentication, WiFi networks, cloud computing, mobile device usage and point-of-sales and transactional security.
AVG AntiVirus Business Edition
Security is what we do – much of what is contained in the business guide also assumes usage of a trusted, multi-layered AV and network security solution.
AVG AntiVirus Business Edition is just that, and for the rest of 2013 we are offering special introductory prices for Australian businesses, starting at just $149.
Got any questions about our SMB guide or our introductory pricing? Leave your comments below and we’ll be able to assist!
