Cybersecurity can be challenging, especially for fledgling small businesses who might not have the time or resources to properly inspect their network for vulnerabilities. Unsurprisingly, this leaves SMBs exposed to hackers and data breach which ultimately leads to financial damages and business losses. Ouch!

Luckily, cyber risk insurance is an affordable and effective option for SMBs looking to protect themselves from the financial ravages of cyber threats. Still, it's better to never face a cyberattack at all, which is why CyberPolicy compiled a few tips for small businesses below.

Safe, Secure & Simplified
One of the most common misconceptions about cybersecurity is that it is expensive, complicated and cumbersome. While this may be true once you get down to the nitty gritty technical levels, the truth of the matter is that small and medium business can drastically improve their defenses with inexpensive behavioral changes and workarounds.

For example, you can host quarterly or even monthly training sessions to discuss the risks associated with operating an online business and how to avoid common cyberattacks.

Honestly, how effective do you think this is? While in-house training sessions obviously cannot replace a dedicated IT staff or external agency, it can vastly improve your digital defenses. In fact, the majority of data breaches (66 percent) are linked to employee negligence. If you properly train your staff, you can help steer your teams away from cyber catastrophe.

Here are a handful of deleterious incidents that can be avoided by simple behavioral changes:

• Brute Force Attacks: An automated brute force attack attempts to crack passwords by guessing sign-in credentials until access is achieved. Thwart these attack by coming up with unique and complicated passphrases!
• Man in the Middle: Everybody loves free public Wi-Fi, but did you know that it is also a major security risk? Hackers can actually see data being transferred to and from an employee's device. Don't let this happen to you! Either employ a virtual private network to obscure your online movements or demand that your employees refrain from working from exposed public connections.
• Data Breach: When sensitive information is discovered or stolen by a hacker, the incident is called a data breach. Crafty cybercriminals can weasel their way into your network, but that's not the only cause of data breach. Unfortunately, employees sometimes send sensitive emails to the wrong person or post customer information to unprotected clouds. Do your best to stop this behavior before it happens.
• Virtual Scams: Malware, social engineering and phishing scams are as old as the internet itself. Yet people still fall for these common cons. Train your employees to identify suspicious emails, attachments, links, downloads and software to stymie virtual scams.

Another important tidbit to keep in mind is that hackers prefer easy targets. That's why they go after SMBs in the first place. If you shore up your cyber defenses and steer clear of common traps, the hacker will more than likely move on.

See? Cybersecurity isn't too tough after all. Reach out to CyberPolicy to help keep your business safe for only pennies a day!