Articles

Data breaches only happen to large corporations, right? Wrong.

It is true that data breaches frequently target giant corporations and medical providers, and those organizations are smart to beef up their cyber security. Such breaches can affect millions of customers and cost companies thousands, if not millions, of dollars.

But many small business owners don’t realize they are targets, too. According to a Verizon Data Breach Investigation Report noted in a 2017 USA TODAY article, 61 percent of breaches hit smaller businesses. A typical cyber attack can cost a small business between $84,000 and $148,000.

Odds are, everyone in your workplace has been warned about opening suspicious-looking emails. You probably know that clicking a link in a malicious email can open your company’s network up to a data breach or some other kind of network attack. Word gets around.

Even so, these attacks—known as “phishing”—continue, and they often work. Someone sends you an email and includes a link that could end up compromising your company if just one employee clicks on it or provides the sensitive information sought.

If everyone’s guard is up, how do malicious actors entice you to click on the link? Here are a few common tactics:

The email seems to be from an authoritative [...]

Wondering if your computer or network has been hacked? Are you worried about malware or spyware?

Sometimes, computers have problems that have nothing to do with malicious activity, but hacking does happen and it is a growing problem. Visit the wrong website, open the wrong email or download the wrong app and you can find yourself with a host of problems. Risks run the gamut from someone ruining your computer to someone accessing your personal data, bank accounts and other crucial information.

It takes a computer forensics examination to determine whether you’ve been hacked and how it was done, but there are some signs you can monitor. If you encounter any of these, you [...]

Network infrastructure devices – the routers, switchers, servers, firewalls and other devices that facilitate communications on yor network – can be prime targets for hackers. Almost all network traffic crosses these crucial devices, and if one of them is compromised a hacker can do serious damage.

For example, an attacker with access to your organization’s gateway router can control traffic going in and out. He can monitor, modify or deny traffic in any direction. An attacker with access to an internal switcher can control traffic within your organization. As the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Computer Emergency Readiness Team puts it succinctly: Whoever controls the [...]