Data breaches are the pertinent threats that are continually crippling the businesses of today. The information which comes in the form of digital data in most cases can be anything. It could be employee information, customer data, passwords, etc. Unless the confidentiality of such vital information is protected appropriately, it adversely affects the business revenue and the brand image. For example, in 2008, 285 million data records were compromised in the Verizon data breach incident. Similarly, the famous JPMorgan chase hacking affected 76 million households and 7 million small businesses.

So, information security comes as an inevitable part of all sizes of businesses. It includes restricting unauthorized access to systems, networks, databases, and cloud storage, becoming a must for all businesses today. Data security for small businesses is especially crucial as they have a limited budget.

Now, what are the different methods used as part of information security? Well, it could be data backups, encryption, disaster recovery, etc. Furthermore, new technologies are also introduced for this purpose. In this blog, we will discuss ten such methods of ensuring data security for small businesses, which is applicable not only for small businesses but also for medium and large enterprises. 

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10 ways to ensure data security for small businesses

 1. Regular data backup. ‘Prevention is better than cure’ – the same is applicable when considering data backup. You cannot predetermine when your data are hacked or an unprecedented data loss may happen. So, timely data backup can prevent you from unexpected data loss. However, there is a glitch here as well in terms of data security for small business. Unless you follow your data backup’s best practices, you may have to compromise with data security for small businesses. 

In this context, service account plays a critical role. If a single service account is used for multiple application backup, it poses threats of security holes. Thus role-based data access and various accounts for data backup help to identify during security auditing and reduce the possibility of data hacking. Also, scheduling data backup for servers and personal computers must be done weekly and incremental.

2. Access management. Not all employees should be given access to organization data. In this context, an admin must determine role-based access for the employees. It is a common scenario that, in most cases, data breaches happen through unauthorized and mishandling of data by the employees themselves. Digital watermarking is a common practice in enterprise data protection, which helps track data records in the database and shows how data is being used and for which purpose. This is applicable for emails, phone calls, file sharing, etc.

3. Regular scan for viruses and malware. Proper firewall management helps to protect the network by controlling internet traffic. It is a very important aspect of data security for small businesses. Besides constant monitoring for malware and virus scanning and timely updating of antivirus software mitigate the risk of virus threats. This is applicable for all digital systems – desktops, laptops, and mobile phones used for business purposes. 

4.Emphasizing password-based protection. Many advanced techniques are used for data authentication, like face recognition, retina scanning, fingerprint scanning, etc. However, password-based data protection is still considered more convenient. Furthermore, if it is a two-step password authentication process, it provides an additional layer of the encryption process. 

5. Implementing Digital Rights Management tools. Unauthorized distribution of digital media and data duplication are breaches of information rights and threatens copyright protection. So, DRM (Digital Rights Management) tools prevent end-users from exploiting data manually or machinery checks for any suspicious data access and usage. It can be through the implementation of embedded code, which defines the regulations on file usage. 

6. Data loss prevention plan – an essential method of data security planning. DLP mainly deals with internal data leakage. A strategy is implemented to focus on internal data breaches, which can put important company information into the wrong hands. This is performed by DLP software, which prevents employees from uploading business data outside the business domain. It also prevents and filters data streams so that the information can’t flow to an unauthorized network.

7.Secured file sharing. As cloud storage has become an obvious storage solution for small to bigger enterprise businesses, file sharing to cloud storage needs additional attention. Thus critical company information must be shared to the cloud through secure cloud service providers. Such providers use two-factor user authentication along with advanced data encryption techniques.

Additionally, with the ongoing hype of BYOD policy, it claims for additional security measures. This includes strict restrictions on P2P server installations if the employees have privileged access to company information through their personal devices.

8. Removing Advanced Persistent Threats ( APT). Phishing messages are advanced data security breaches that silently evade the security system and steal the company’s essential confidential data. This type of threat is commonly known as an advanced persistent threat that does not damage the system; instead, it remains undetected for a longer time in a network through spear-phishing techniques. Using software to detect such a threat is also necessary as part of the data security for small business operations. 

9. Establishing proper physical data security. Not only digital security but also physical security is a mandatory part of the planning of data security for small businesses. For this, a few of the following measures can be taken – 

• Establishing a disaster recovery site in the proximity of the data center.
• Remote surveillance at the disaster recovery site
• Authorized access in the disaster recovery site
• No exposure to outside personnel for the data center and disaster recovery site.

10. Preventing DoS and DDoS attacks. DoS and DDoS are two common network threats that overwhelm the network with ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) flooding. It costs a lot, mainly small businesses. Though it is difficult to stop such message flooding, nowadays, many updated software and web services can detect such ICMP flooding. It is using SYN cookies, and bandwidth expansion help to control such damage as part of data security for small business.

Final thought

Hence, proper data security planning can help your business to avoid the next major data breach incident. Besides, it is of utmost necessary to train and teach the employees to take action against possible data threats proactively and diligently use data. As a small or medium business executing, all the steps mentioned above could sometimes be cumbersome and costly. With the help of a third-party managed service provider, it can be well organized easily. So, why late? Be proactive and establish the best data security for small business!