Internet is a blessing in disguise for an organization aware of its benefits but has been overlooking the possible threats. Every help comes with a responsibility to handle the medium. When you decide to allow your employees to choose their device to work, networking offered by you needs to be protected. If you can preserve your cyber-enabled data, you can conquer all the perks of having BYOD and remote working by the organization’s employees. Let’s discuss few terms before we get to the threats and emerging need for cyber security.
BYOD- Bring Your Device
Today, the world has learned the new way to work from home and contribute your share towards the commitment by working from smartphones and personal laptops. The concept of BYOD is accepted worldwide. Every organization that has networking and allows their employees to work as per their own choice has been the major contributor to this concept’s upscaling.
Apart from comforting employees, an organization cannot overlook the essential need to maintain its data security. Cyber security is critical for every organization to prevent the intentional and unintentional sharing of data and information.
Whenever there is a need, innovation takes over and provides justice to the one requiring it. In layman’s language, if there is a collective need for any product or service. The inventor will create it. The technology behind cyber security is hi-tech and involves an in-depth study of data, governing laws, and codes. Ensuring BYOD security is the new need of every organization. As per the studies, there has been an instant increase in the compromise of essential data, customer data, critical information, etc. Majorly after the introduction of the usage of smartphones for conducting business.
WFH (Work from home)
It is a culture in which you are expected to stay at home and manage your work from your premises. Don’t get too hard on yourself. If you don’t need to be at your place, you can be anywhere to get internet access. You have to use your device to update your sheets and files. Hence, there is a need to protect the transferor updating of files performed by you.
What are the major threats if the concept of smartphone security is overlooked?
- Loss of reputation: One of the most common situations the organization faces after information gets leaked over the internet is the loss of importance in the market. The situation can cost an organization a million dollars and even reduce possible opportunities to create profitable prospects.
- Sharing of credentials: If the essential need of BYOD Security is overlooked, credentials of customers and fellow employees can get shared over the internet. This is one of the major threats which is alarming for everyone. The organization can get harmed up to an unimaginable extend. As a result, customers lose their faith in the organization and lose their valuable customers.
- Compromise of crucial information with competitors: Employees may use the excess unsecured network while using smartphones and personal gadgets. Ultimately, competitors will take advantage of such situations, and you can never find out who was responsible for the same. Boundaries are essential to protect the data from possible sharing. It is one of the significant disadvantages faced by the organization.
- Financial loss: Every possible threat is considered a direct or indirect financial loss. It can scale up to the level of harm an organization faces for compromising its crucial information. The disadvantage is usually not measurable; instead is estimated by the organization. If the matter is not taken seriously, it can result in a more significant issue.
The threats do not stop here but are much more comprehensive than the ones mentioned above.
The recent change in the formulation of laws related to cyber security has tightened the grip of the possible boundaries drawn to ensure that data and information are protected. As a result, these laws are implemented, and security measures are introduced to protect the cloud applications used to access organizational data. The possibilities that can work effectively are the reforms adopted by the government to protect the rights of the users. Cyber security laws need to be shaped so that no cyber-enabled fraud is performed and the hustle gets away in an instant. Measures are being taken to protect the data and information by the authorities. Yet, there is a lot of room for improvement. There is a long way to go as the internet has many loop poles. A hacker or cracker can easily take advantage of a vulnerable situation.
Precaution is the best cure.
- An organization needs to educate the employees about the importance of cyber security. Steps have to be taken to demonstrate the possible outcome of overlooking the security measures.
- An organization needs to check the level of security offered by the cloud network and cloud storage. Safety is primary when it comes to cloud usage. It should be prioritized to prevent any possible cyber fraud.
- Adoption of smartphone security is compulsory. The secure network provided by the company should be opted to store and share the data within the organization even if it is being accessed over your smartphone.
The creation and implementation of such policies are essential for every organization.
Gradually, security measures can be strengthened, and strict rules can be laid down. Quick implementation should be avoided; a rather step-by-step implementation of essential securities policies should be adopted. It may create confusion and misinterpretation of facts. Every organization needs to help their employees to accept the new work culture and understand the benefits of adopting BYOD security. The measures will be fruitful in the long run for employees and the organization. It will be protecting the data which is internally and externally exchanged during the business. The importance of data security should not be overlooked at any cost.
To overcome all data center physical and logical security, all businesses that offer data center services and have numerous client data housed and controlled by data center service providers must develop a zero-trust architecture.
Organizations can create and maintain a reliable digital infrastructure with the help of Fulcrum’s Cloud and Infrastructure Engineering. Our clients gain from our comprehensive infrastructure support, qualified professionals providing round-the-clock service, and strong OEM technology alliances.
Author: Vaibhav Tare is a CISO & Head of Cloud Infrastructure at Fulcrum Digital with over 27 years of cybersecurity, cloud, enterprise data center infrastructure experience. In his role, he advises customers, partners, ISVs, and OEMs on best practices for developing cybersecurity, data center and cloud management strategies and architecting and designing data center modernization blueprints with software defined infrastructure projects.
