Cyber Security – A Government Warning

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (or DCMS for short) has issued a further warning to both business and charities about the cost of cyber breaches.

The average annual cost to business or charities has been assessed at £4,180.00, which for smaller organisations is a considerable loss to recover.

However, its not all bad news: Whilst 32% of business identified a cyber breach in 2019, this is a reduction on the previous years percentage (43%).

In addition, charities appear to be taking cyber security more seriously, with 75% having protocols in place in 2019 compared to 53% in 2018.

As a smaller organisation what can you do to protect information and assets?

The National Cyber Security Council (or NCSC for short) recommend the following key steps:

Protect your network from attack, and filter out unauthorised access or malicious content.

Train staff and volunteers to be aware of cyber attacks and possible scams.

Establish anti-malware defences across your organisation.

Be careful how you use removable media like USB sticks or Dongles.

Limit user privileges and monitor user activity.

Think about information recovery in the event of a cyber attack.

Analyse unusual activity which could trigger an attack.

Develop a mobile working policy and train staff in understanding and adhering to it.

More information can be obtained from www.ncsc.gov.uk.

If you have any concerns about cyber security issues please contact Keith Johnson at Hunts Forum (keith@huntsforum.org.uk) in the first instance, or telephone 01480 420604.