Without These Tools, Your Network Isn’t Secure
Your business might have a limited budget, but this shouldn’t hold you back from implementing the best and strongest security solutions. However, security isa complicated process for any business. This is problematic, especially since common threats and vulnerabilities show up frequently in the business environment. We’ll walk you through some security basics so that you can optimize your organization’s protection.
First and foremost, the basic tasks of security tools can be accomplished through the use of preventative solutions found in a Unified Threat Management (UTM) device. A UTM includes a firewall, antivirus, spam blocker, and content filter, allowing you to reduce the number of threats your business is exposed to and prevent hacking attacks entirely.
Firewalls
Firewalls are generally considered the bouncers to your business’ network, as they keep track of the traffic that flows into and out of it. This keeps harmful threats from entering and causing trouble, and keeps dangerous traffic from spreading to other parts of your network. You can then isolate and destroy any threats that are identified as problematic. Most computers these days come with a consumer-grade firewall pre-installed, but you don’t want to rely on these for your business’ security. An enterprise-grade firewall found in a UTM can be just the thing you need to keep your network secure.
Antivirus
While your firewall is busy keeping threats out of your network, the antivirus will be the force responsible for quarantining and eliminating any that do slip past the defenses. Antivirus programs scan your computer for any abnormalities, and then take action to eliminate them.
Spam Protection
Spam is something that even the average PC user will encounter, as these messages in your inbox waste your time and threaten the security of potentially important information. If you don’t take a preventative stance against spam, it could bother your employees and trick them into clicking on the wrong links or attachments. Spam is the preferred method of travel for threats, as it’s easy to hide malicious code in embedded links or images, as well as attachments. With spam protection, you can keep these messages from getting to your inbox in the first place, saving you the time and effort required to comb through it for threats.
Content Filtering
If you have some employees who can’t seem to keep themselves off of social media or YouTube, how do you keep them on task? The best solution to this is a content filter, which allows your organization control over the website users’ access on the Internet. This also allows you to keep your employees from accessing sites that contain malicious, dangerous, or distracting content, allowing you to get more productivity out of your workers while maximizing security.
To take your business’s security to the next level, consider a UTM solution. To learn more, reach out to Catalyst Technology Group at (317) 705-0333.
A VPN Allows Productivity Without Sacrificing Security
Security needs to be a priority for everyone involved with business. This has led to a rise in the use of solutions that will protect the security and privacy of the user and their systems. A very common, yet effective, means of securing your data is to use a virtual private network, or VPN.
A VPN is a network that masks your activity through encryption and routes your web traffic through servers located somewhere that you are not. These safeguards allow a user to worry less about having their data stolen in transit. This feature makes VPNs useful to businesses, especially to organizations that have employees that work remotely, on the road, or from multiple locations.
Using a VPN, a worker can remotely access their business’ network without fear of their data being harvested, allowing the worker to maintain their productivity, whether they’re sick and stuck at home or across the world on business. Some VPNs can even maintain a virtual desktop, allowing a worker to access their workstation remotely and use it just as though they were in the office.
In a world where everything seems to happen online, it is more important than ever to protect your business against cybercrime. Criminals have been quick to embrace technology and use it to their advantage.
Let’s consider a quick scenario: you’re on a business trip, staying the night in a chain hotel. At your free continental breakfast, you decide to get some work done on your laptop. You could potentially be at risk of cyberattack the moment you connect the device to the hotel’s Wi-Fi, and unlike other crimes, the cybercriminal doesn’t even have to be there to participate. They could be sitting in a diner down the street or at their 9-to-5 job on the other side of town, letting a planted device to their dirty work for them.
It is unnerving to think of how much someone can learn about you based on data they intercept. A journalist was able to take data from a completely ‘smart’ apartment in Bucharest and write a story about the resident of that apartment based off a week’s worth of data. The fictional story was almost completely accurate to the resident, even though the writer had never met him. Imagine the damage that a cyber criminal could do with that amount of comprehensive data.
For reasons like these, it is all the more important that you leverage a VPN for your business’ protection.
VPNs are also commonly used to sneak past geographic restrictions on certain websites, which has led to some countries banning them outright. China, for example, has made the use of VPNs illegal after they were used to undermine the Great Firewall, allowing citizens to view content that was censored by the government. Russia has followed a similar route, with Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and Venezuela all considering following suit. These laws make it considerably more difficult for many businesses to ensure their security, as these countries may find out sooner or later.
As for your business, a VPN is a tool that you should implement to better ensure your data security. Catalyst Technology Group can help you get one set up, just give us a call at (317) 705-0333.