Ransomware has been wreaking havoc throughout the business world for the past decade. With no signs of stopping, security experts have been troubled as to what to advise to clients.
What specific steps have you likely taken already?
Patched your computers?—while experts have been hounding users for years, several businesses that stay vulnerable to attacks—including those throughout healthcare—lack even the most basic updates (updates that Microsoft and other software companies release free of charge) to keep hackers from penetrating their networks. If you’re powered by Dynamic Edge, rest assured we patch and test patches on ALL of your machines.
Train users to understand consequences of clicking on suspicious links?—I’m sure by now you are well-aware of the necessities in keeping your users up to speed on the latest types of attacks. In fact, many criminals still depend completely on users to give them the keys to your data. If you are a Dynamic Edge client, you should expect training as a part of our service to you (either in person, online or just chatting with a technician). We understand that training is a big part of the puzzle to keep your business and its sensitive data safe.
Backing up your data?—another biggie that we have probably hounded you with over the years is making sure your backups are working (and that your data is routinely backed up). If you were to have an outage or an attack, could you get back and running without major hiccups?
Powered by Dynamic Edge means that your backups are taken EVERY SINGLE HOUR. That means that if something did happen, you’d hardly even notice. Typically, we can get folks up and running from an event within the hour because we meticulously back up your ENTIRE network.
Protecting the perimeter? —yes, I mean firewalls here. And many businesses still think they’re safe on older technologies. Simply because you have a firewall in place DOESN’T mean you’re completely safe from the next ransomware attack. Rather, you may feel falsely secure and protected from attacks that could cripple the entirety of your business. If you’re powered by Dynamic Edge, you have the latest technologies detecting and monitoring malicious traffic around every single computer. Modern firewalls can’t simply be a fence protecting bad guys from getting into your building because we’re on the move working in and out of the office at all hours of the day and night.
But one of the BIGGEST liabilities many businesses don’t digest is that using outdated Microsoft Office platforms can throw all of the hard work and money they’ve spent on security—down the drain!
With outdated Microsoft products—MS Word, Excel, Power Point (just for examples)—comes big security risks. The problem lies in the fact that some of the Microsoft products that you and your team have learned to rely on (those products that may be out of date) are the very products cybercriminals are on the hunt for. Since Microsoft no longer supports many of the older versions of Microsoft Office, those of us still using older versions are actually putting our businesses at greater risk of cyberattacks that actually work!
One very real threat could be delivered to your mailbox with an attachment. Spoofed as an email from the boss and demanding immediate attention be paid to the attached Word Document that needs proofing and finalization, a criminal may prompt someone not suspecting a phishing attack, to fall hook line and sinker.
Even though your team may have taken the training and are normally able to detect scams, could you risk the chance of one breaking through the barriers?
If your team was using older versions of MS Office, once the Word attachment was opened, your entire network may be at jeopardy. Whereas in later versions of Office (maybe even the latest version), you’re protected because Microsoft identified a security vulnerability and made sure you’re not at risk of a cyberattack targeting that vulnerability.
But even more, Microsoft claims in its latest O365 description that it has taken major strides to address cybersecurity and ransomware concerns in its platform with the following features:
File restore—you know are able to restore your entire OneDrive to a previous point in time within the last 30 days. If something got deleted or was corrupted, this feature allows you to recover your precious files.
Ransomware detection—O365 now has a new security feature that detects ransomware attacks and alerts you through email, mobile or desktop notifications and helps you restore your files to a point before malware compromised the files.
Password protection on shared links—O365 allows you to set a password for shared files and folders to prevent unauthorized access if your recipient accidentally forwards your email.
Email encryption—end to end email encryption over a secure connection provides you with additional protection from a sensitive email being intercepted.
Prevent forwarding—you now have the option to restrict your email recipients from forwarding or copying emails you send to them from Outlook.
Link checking—Word, Excel and PowerPoint all have real-time web protection which monitors every link you click in a MS files and notifies you if it’s suspicious.
Are you certain your current version of Microsoft Office is safe to use? Not sure why else you should switch to O365 for your business? If you have any concerns about what you currently are using or about switching over to O365, please call us today to figure out what strategy works best for you.
