Field Notes: Your Small Business Isn't Immune
I hate to be the one to bear bad news, but your small business isn't immune to cyber threats. You've read about Equifax, Target, Sony, Ashley Madison and the other big hacks. Those happen to large, multinational companies with troves of data that make an alluring target for hackers. My little company is too small to be of any interest, I don't really have anything that a hacker would want. Those big companies have the financial wherewithal to spend on cyber security, in fact, post hack Target admitted to having spent hundreds of millions of dollars on cyber defense.
Despite the fact that that we invested hundreds of millions of dollars in data security, had a robust system in place, and had recently been certified as PCI compliant, the unfortunate reality is that we experienced a data breach.
You are probably thinking right now, my small business doesn't have millions of dollars, much less hundreds of millions, to spend on cyber defense. If Target spent that much, and still suffered a breach, how can I ever hope to protect myself? Isn't my best bet is just to hope for the best and focus my limited resources elsewhere?
Good question, and I can understand why you might think that way. The simple answer is, it doesn't take millions of dollars to protect most small businesses, and, yes, your business is at risk. Your information technology landscape is much simpler than Target, Sony, or Equifax. While most cyber security companies are looking for big fish and their millions of dollars in cyber budget, Bitscope focuses on small businesses and their unique cyber defense needs. Just because you are a smaller company doesn't mean that you rely on technology any less, or that your security needs are any less important. Many small to mid-sized businesses are heavily reliant on information technology, such as email, financial, human resources, and operations systems, and yet they are left to themselves to wonder how to secure all of this technology.
In fact, a cyber incident likely represents a bigger threat to your small business than it does to a larger company. Large companies have the capacity to ride out the storm, wait for the dust to settle, and restart operations. What would happen to your company if a cyber incident cost you $50,000? What if that incident also impacted your ability to invoice clients? Or pay employees? What if that impact lasted days, or weeks? What if you had to notify all of your customers that their private data, that was in your possession, had been stolen?
It doesn't have to be that way. Bitscope is focused on providing high quality cyber security to small businesses, with the goal of protecting their digital assets while not breaking their budget. In many cases, small, simple changes to the way your organization operates can have a dramatic impact on your overall security posture and risk levels.
You can have good security at a reasonable cost, give us a call.
