Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, remote work has been a standard practice for businesses of all sizes and types. These changes have increased the cybersecurity dangers associated with working from home. To successfully adopt to this mode of working and reduce the security risks related to remote working, employers and individuals must understand crucial security guidelines.
The first truth is that expansion broadens your business’s relationships with the outside world, opening up new channels of communication with less well-known parties and their networks. The “attack surface” of your business, in other words, grows. Even worse, it might be challenging to organize cybersecurity since development does not always occur in predictable or consistent ways. Cybersecurity is crucial, but it may also be perceived as a direct counter to rapid expansion. If your shareholders appreciate growth, the cost/benefit to security that would apply under the status quo may not be the same.
Security Risks Associated with Working from Home
- Ransomware
A form of virus known as ransomware allows cybercriminals to lock or prevent people from accessing their own data or devices. Typically, hackers take over a computer and threaten to erase, destroy, or disclose data if a ransom is not paid.
Ransomware’s main goal is to defraud or extort its victims. They are frequently propagated via phishing emails with malicious attachments that take over a device, encrypt files, or even whole devices, after infecting them. Other ransomware attacks direct victims to bogus websites that download dangerous software onto their computers using social engineering or drive-by downloading.
- Weak Passwords
The persistent use of weak, insecure, or recycled passwords and login credentials poses one of the largest hazards to businesses’ remote workforces. Cybersecurity software and technologies like firewalls and virtual private networks are rendered useless if safe passwords are not used.
Hackers can now use software to access critical corporate data and crack account passwords. For instance, they can create extensive lists of popular passwords to get access to accounts or create computer code that correctly guesses login combinations using a variety of password variations. Another typical strategy is to try to access their corporate account logins by using passwords they are aware someone else has used for another account, like a personal email or social networking site.
- File Sharing
File-sharing services are frequently used by remote workers to distribute files and documents to their coworkers. When kept on business networks, these files are probably encrypted for security. However, the same level of protection might not be applicable when shared remotely.
- Unsecure Wi-fi
Corporate Wi-Fi networks are normally safe because strong firewalls guard them, monitoring and preventing unwanted traffic. However, distant workers may use unprotected Wi-Fi networks to access company networks and systems.
For instance, the majority of individuals frequently update the antivirus or firmware on their smartphones, but they seldom ever do the same for their home routers. As a result, their home network may be exposed to a data breach, endangering the confidentiality of corporate data.
- Personal Devices
Using personal devices to connect to work networks and systems poses one of the biggest security dangers of remote working. The cybersecurity of these devices is frequently inferior to that of a laptop or business PC. Personal telephones frequently don’t safeguard personal data with encryption, and home printers can have security flaws that hackers can use against them.
Working from home safely has become an essential component of cybersecurity for businesses all over the world. And to do that, hybrid work security strategies that attack the issue from all sides must be adopted.
Multiple risks associated with remote employment have major repercussions. It’s necessary to monitor and secure millions of new connections and endpoints. Corporate resources must be securely accessible from a distance by employees, necessitating the modernization of outdated infrastructure. Intelecis can help you lower and eliminate the risks, simply contact us.
