How many people can say the business they work in today is the same as it was in 2019? Consider how even the words work “in” are no longer relevant for so many employees.
One of the biggest changes in 2020 was the wholesale shift of so many workers from offices to homes. Before the pandemic, some businesses had remote working policies in place, but it’s become a mainstay for nearly all of them today.
While the rapid migration to remote working is playing a key role in helping businesses trade through the pandemic, it’s also brought some challenges – particularly with security.
Employees can often be targeted by cyber criminals seeking to gain access to a company’s network and data. But if they have the knowledge and training to fight off those attacks, they can beat them back at the furthest edges of your business.
Helping employees to understand the types of risk that are created by remote working and how to deal with them is one of the most effective forms of cyber defence there is.
The 2020 Security Priorities Study by IDG found 36% of security incidents were caused by remote employees falling victim to phishing or other non-malicious violations of security policy. A further 29% of security incidents involved unpatched software vulnerabilities.
The Ponemon Institute issued a separate report, Cybersecurity in the Remote Work Era: A Global Risk Report, which found:
This is understandable. If your business had problems with employees following security policies when they were inside the building, how much harder is it when they’re miles away and on their own?
Your business needs to ask:
People are a security risk, but only if their devices give cyber attackers access to corporate networks and data. Remote working greatly expanded the number of endpoints outside the office and the network perimeter. This raises some important questions:
Unified endpoint management is one means for your business to control PCs and mobile endpoints with a single pane of glass management interface. You can push updates to those devices, apply security policies and remotely wipe all applications and data if the device is lost or stolen.
With so many employees accessing the corporate network and data from remote locations that are often less secure than company premises, your business needs to take a close look at how it protects and secures confidential and sensitive data.
According to the above-mentioned IDG report, 59% of businesses revealed that access to business-critical applications has increased. This is concerning, as data security and integrity are vital for modern companies.
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