An Increasing Number of Hackers Targeting at Small Businesses

February 9th, 2010 |

The evolution of the internet and innovations in technology has resulted in criminal activity that can harm consumers and businesses. For instance, it is not only multi billion dollar corporations facing online threats such as hackers. Small businesses are now facing the same security threats as large corporations. Reports are now coming out showing that more hackers are targeting small businesses. The reason that there is an increase in hacker attacks is that small businesses are seen as more vulnerable as they do not have the same security measures as the big corporations.

When a hacker penetrates a small business server system, they are searching for customer information such as credit card information and identity information. They are also looking for business data that they can exploit. Small businesses tend to have more security holes as they do not have the knowledge and IT team to properly secure their systems. This has made small business vulnerable to such dangers as Trojans, viruses, spam, and Phishing attacks. As well, hackers are finding it easier to actually penetrate a small business server system. For instance, if a small retail store that does thousands of transactions daily has an unsecured system, a hacker can get in and steal thousands of their customer financial information such as credit card data.

Many small businesses think that they are too small to be of interest to a criminal, so their physical security is more lax such as not properly destroying hard copies of financial information such as transaction documents. There are people out there that will go into a small businesses trash to locate financial and personal business and customer information. As well, if a small business allows their staff to surf the company internet without having a strong and effective security policy, an employee may unknowingly allow the penetration of hackers, Trojans, viruses, and Phishing programs.

Security experts agree that small businesses must take security vulnerabilities seriously. They recommend that a small business use the services of security companies such as a PCI compliancy providers to protect their business. A PCI compliancey provider will protect a small business around the clock.

PCI compliancy providers create and maintain a secure firewall, set secure passwords, manage incoming and outgoing messages that includes constant monitoring for abnormal changes, prevent intrusions, track traffic, perform security audits, test systems for vulnerabilities, and set secure configuration standards. As well, these providers will protect cardholder data by using effective encryption methods that cannot be decrypted by an outsider, and they set up a secure database for storing customer cardholder data.

A PCI compliancy provider will also regularly update anti-virus software, set up a software security management program, assign a unique ID to each person with computer access, restrict physical access to each person with computer access, implement strict password management policies, restrict physical access to cardholder data, and establish a security policy for all staff to follow.

The threats to small businesses are real, therefore it is important that a small business set up strong and effective PCI compliant security programs to protect themselves and their customers.

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