Since the emergence of COVID-19 when businesses were enacting mandatory work from home policies, we recognized the need for enhanced physical and cyber security. Our workspace, regardless of location, needs to remain secure to protect individual and corporate proprietary information no matter the environment. Follow below for a few tips from Knowledge Services to on how to protect yourself and your work – no matter where you are.
Secure Your Calls
To better secure company information, be mindful of your location at all times and make sure phone calls are held privately. KS advises all to use headphones when around others while on calls or video conferences to maintain confidentiality. Being aware of who might be hanging around your workspace (contractors, cleaners, etc.) is the first step in achieving privacy and protection.
Secure Your Workspace at All Times
To protect your private company data, KS encourages everyone to always lock their workspace when walking away from their desktop. Moreover, many companies also advise their employees to use privacy screens to ensure additional discretion if needed.
Protect Your Data
Although always critical, it is especially important for the transient worker to keep work data and other important files in a secure and safe location provided and approved by the company. Also, understanding a back-up schedule that works best for you is ideal and you’ll want to become diligent with it.
Be Vigilant and Watchful of Phishing Emails
Cyber-attacks are on the rise and cyber criminals are targeting organizations every day. To guard yourself and your employer, be aware of emails containing the following:
- Actions needing to take place; responses, providing credentials, clickable hyperlinks, etc.
- Skeptical subject lines
- Unrecognized email addresses
- Poorly written content
- Suspicious attachments
If you see anything suspicious within suspected phishing emails, report them to your IT team immediately and do not click on or open anything that might put your company at risk. To prep your team members, your company can also schedule fictitious phishing emails to members of your team to see how they will respond and allow them to understand the dangers of possible attacks.
Warrant a Confident Connection
If you’re having trouble connecting to your company’s network while using company devices, reach out to your team members in IT immediately to see what the problem is. For computers, phones, or any other devices that may connect, always ensure a secure connection. Be sure to connect to your VPN (Virtual Private Network) to remain under your organization’s security umbrella and receive updates from your IT department. Furthermore, you will want to keep any foreign devices off the network.
Always Use a Robust Password
Using different passwords for all of your devices and accounts seems like common sense, however, it’s been reported that 64% of people use the same password for at least some of their online accounts. Ensure that your password is of certain qualifying length, with a wide range of numbers, and special characters. You should also continue to update it throughout the calendar year for maximum security. Your technology team can better specify how often you should be changing your credentials for more security.
Set Up Multi-Factor Authentication
Enabling multifactor authentication on your accounts is one of the simplest ways of ensuring cyber security. Multifactor authentication, or MFA, ties your online account to two different devices. When attempting to login to your account on one of those devices, you will receive a confirmation message on your second device.
MFA is also extremely helpful in identifying fraudulent attempted logins. For instance, if you receive a notification of an unfamiliar attempted login on another device, you know right away that you need to change that account’s password.
At Knowledge Services, we are committed to physical and cyber security. We encourage all professionals and companies to always stay alert and watchful of physical space and cyber threats. Especially during this time working from home, it is up to each user to maintain these standard security protocols.
No one wants to be responsible for allowing a virus to run wild through their organization. KS wants YOU to think about how you can improve your security practice today. Is there a small task you can start (or stop) doing today that will improve your security?
