Tips for Cyber Security Awareness Month

Did you know?

October is Cyber Security Awareness Month!

To mark the occasion (and more importantly, help protect you and your business from threats), we’re sharing some of our top cyber security-related tips!

One easy way you can work to ensure your online security is by creating and maintaining strong passwords.

Here’s some pointers:

• Use a mix of upper and lower case letters
• Don’t use anything obvious or personal
• Include special characters e.g. £$@
• Don’t repeat passwords
• Regularly update passwords
• Use a password manager, e.g. Keeper
• Never share your password with others

Knowing how to spot the signs of a phishing attempt can also help protect you and your business.

(If you’re unfamiliar with the term, phishing can be described as the mailicious process of obtaining confidential information through emails. These emails often look very convincing and are designed for you to open, click on links and enter private data.)

Here’s some guidance:

• Check the senders email address. Scammers often try to impersonate companies. They may use email addresses that are similar to legitimate ones but with small differences you may not notice without close inspection.
• Look for urgency or spelling mistakes. Phishing emails often create a sense of urgency to try and get you to act quickly. They may also be poorly written.
• Remember to always take caution when clicking links in emails, especially when they are from an unknown sender.

Software updates can seem inconvenient, but they are actually really important, especially when it comes to cyber security and keeping you protected.

Developers release software updates in order to address security vulnerabilities. They constantly work to identify and patch security loopholes, protecting their users from cybercriminals. If you ignore updates, you’ll remain exposed to any vulnerabilities, increasing the risk of a cyberattack.

Our final tip to help protect you and your business from threats this Cyber Security Awareness Month is to utilise MFA. MFA is an authentication process designed to keep your accounts more secure. It essentially requires you to provide additional verification (usually a code sent to you via email or text) before logging into an account.

In a world where cyber attacks are becoming more sophisticated and passwords are no longer enough to keep your accounts secure, MFA acts as an extra layer of defence.

The tips we’ve shared here are just a starting point, we strongly encourage you to do your own research and stay up to date with cyber security best practices all year round.

Looking to improve cyber security on a business level? We can help.

Just get in touch with us on 0161 241 9050 or info@aspectit.co.uk.

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