It may have been the season to be jolly for a lot of us, but for Cyber Criminals the holiday season presents itself as prime hunting season. At this time of the year, many would have been looking forward to kicking back and enjoying the festivities, meaning that businesses are susceptible to letting their guard down during the holiday seasons and in turn, giving Cyber Criminals a potential window of opportunity.
During this time, hackers will increase their efforts by trying out new tactics such as:
Mobiles and IoT Devices:
Hackers are constantly coming up with new innovative ways to access private data. In the past twelve months, we have seen a high number of cases where mobiles and IoT devices have been used as network entry points by Cybercriminals. This means that hackers can use devices such as Mobile phones, tablets, washing machines and coffee machines, to access your data if they are unsecured.
Emails:
During the holiday periods, cyber-attacks involving emails increase tenfold. For example, during the month of December, it is noticeable that users are likely to encounter multiple phishing emails disguised as Christmas well wishes or festive competitions.
Online Shopping:
With the increased web traffic due to Holiday Spending, hackers may also use web pop-ups and key loggers amongst other tactics, as a means to track and obtain online shoppers’ personal information (contact details, credit/debit card details etc).
What does this mean for businesses?
The festive season means that employees are very likely to spend their lunch or break time doing a bit of online shopping for example at Christmas. This presents a threat to businesses because employees will be using their mobile devices (which might be unsecured) to access online shopping pages (which might be compromised by hackers).
A successful attack on an employee whilst connected to the business network means a successful attack on the business.
Safeguarding your business
Inform:
Employees will be the targeted by a fresh new wave of cyber-attacks such as online scams and phishing emails. It is therefore important to ensure that they are trained on how to recognise email scams and know how to operate in the event of an attack.
Cloudsis offers a Network Security Training course that aims to teach users about Cyber-Attack awareness, as well as how to respond appropriately in those circumstances.
Back up:
Cyber criminals will likely attack businesses during the holiday season anticipating that IT teams are most likely to be understaffed and less vigilant during this time. It is therefore important to ensure that your data is backed up regularly and up to date, so that you can revert back to a previous instance it in the event of any possible attack.
With Cloudsis Cloud Solutions, businesses will benefit from Full daily backups kept for 30 days, with the option for 180 days and custom options. Available up to 7 years to meet regulatory standards.
Protect:
It is worth investing in a top grade Firewall system to insure that any attacks can be recognised and quarantined easily.
Cloudsis can help you ramp up your network protection with its state of the art Network Security system which includes a Firewall, Anti-Spam and Anti-Virus protection.