Many organisations across the UK have experienced how difficult it is to run a business during a pandemic, as well as preparing for a new year ahead post-Brexit. That’s why security measures, such as protecting your business from cybercrime, can feel like the least of your worries during this time.
On the contrary, implementing security measures to protect your business from spam, viruses and malware attacks should be a priority. With 2022 the busiest year on record for cyber attacks against UK firms, the likelihood of this decreasing in 2023 are slim.
Do you know what caused this increase in cybercrime? Some may say that switching to remote working was the direct cause, but that wasn’t the case for customers using Citadel’s Hosted Desktop. Here is why your business might be at risk when working from home.
Why multiple points of entry make life more difficult
Unbeknownst to many businesses in the UK, some methods of remote working have increased the potential points of entry for cyber criminals to attack companies and their data. And it isn’t their fault…
With the quick move to working from home in 2020, numerous companies across the UK were unprepared in terms of security measures implemented and technology required, especially since business owners were unsure as to how long the pandemic would last.
Yet nearly one year later, there still remains to beone in three UK workers currently based exclusively at home, with many working with:
- Insufficient security measures in place (such as free malware and firewall software)
- Personal laptops/computers that are used both in work and out-of-work
- VPNs that provide no protection for business servers from malware that is already installed on an employee’s device.
For a business that consists of 50 employees, all working from home and connecting to their work server with at least one of the above security risks in place, then the points of entry for cyber attacks will be in the hundreds.
Every time an employee logs into an application online, such as Microsoft SharePoint or Sage, then that organisation’s data is at risk of being compromised, especially if the employee is unaware that their computer contains malware.
Research shows that anaverage cyber attack costs UK businesses more than £2 million.
This is where Citadel Technology come in… With our Citadel bubble via our hosted desktop, we protect businesses from exposure of multiple points of entry and to reduce the risk of costly attacks.
Welcome to the Citadel Bubble!
What is the Citadel bubble, you may ask?
Well, at Citadel Technology, we protect our customers in something we like to call theCitadel bubble.
The Citadel bubble is a secure location that is contained within our hosted desktop, which ensures data exchanged between your workspace and servers is contained and never leaves the environment. Therefore, the Citadel bubble minimises the scope of anything malicious happening to your business information.
It is essentially a safe space where you and your employees are able to work and share information, without the increased risk of data loss or cyber attacks. This bubble applies to wherever you are working and whatever device you are working on as well, as once you are inside your Citadel Hosted Desktop, you are protected by the bubble (even if you are in a completely different continent)!
When our customers log into their Citadel Desktop, their device is automatically disassociated from our customer’s workspace. The Hosted Desktop acts as a window into their virtual computer, which is protected by our extensive security measures.
What measures do we take to ensure that your sensitive business data is securely stored in the cloud? Check out the measures that we have in place:
https://citadel.tech/hosted-desktop/security-management/
Even though we have explained what the Citadel bubble is and how it can help your business, let’s put you into a couple of scenarios and see which one you would prefer!
Scenario One:
You are working on your computer at home. The task you are undertaking an extraction of client data, which includes account information, names and addresses from your finance system.
Once the extract is finished, you save it as a spreadsheet into your One Drive.
During the course of the next few hours, you are editing and creating documents and spreadsheets, saving and accessing them back and forth to your One Drive, which contains the sensitive data.
During the transfer between your laptop and One Drive, something intercepts and interferes with your data, potentially without you knowing. This interference was caused by a malware that was installed on your computer and has now obtained your business’ sensitive data.
Scenario Two:
You are working on your laptop in a café, connected via the public Wi-Fi. You sign into your hosted desktop and you start to work on extracting your client’s financial data, including company information, names and addresses.
Once the extract is finished, you save it as a spreadsheet into your company shared drive.
During the course of the next few hours, you are editing and creating documents and spreadsheets, saving and accessing them back and forth between your shared drive on the Citadel’s Hosted Desktop.
The transfer of the documents to and from your desktop to their storage location remains in the same platform as your hosted desktop. The data never leaves the ‘Citadel Bubble’, meaning that nothing from the outside world can interfere with these files and your client data.
Which scenario do you prefer?We know which option we would choose – scenario two will ensure that your business data is protected at all costs, whenever and wherever you work, all thanks to the Citadel bubble!
Why Cyber Security is Important
For companies that are experiencing working virtually for the first time, it can be difficult to wrap your heard around the importance of cyber security measures, such as the Citadel bubble. A question which we come across regularly is ‘why is cyber security important?’ or ‘why do I need cyber security?’.
To understand why cyber security is important for all businesses, no matter your company size or industry expertise, watch this video from Microsoft.
To summarise, 5 reasons why cyber security is important are:
- Cybercrime is on the rise meaning your business is at more of a risk
- Damage to your business is significant if attacked online (e.g., finances, reputation, business growth)
- Cybersecurity builds trust of brand, product and/or services meaning your customers and employees will feel protected
- Our identities protect our data, for the employees and for organisations
- Every organisation has vulnerabilities; therefore, it is important to protect every nook and cranny!
If you would like to know more about cyber security, then check out the UK Government’s cyber security guide for small businesses.
To Summarise…
Research, implementing and maintaining IT security measures can be difficult and time-consuming – something which business owners and decision makers do not have time for.
But the protection of your business from cybercrime is vital, especially to ensure your business upholds data protection of your employees and customers.
By keeping your data secure in the Citadel bubble using our hosted desktop, you are;
- Minimising the risk of data breaches considerably
- Reducing the number of cyberattacks
- Protecting your employees, wherever they work
- Keeping your data all in one place.
All of this is possible with Citadel’s Hosted Desktop. If you would like to find out what other features our cloud desktop has to offer, then click the link below to find out more:
The Bottom Line
It is safe to say that 2020 was a shock to all of us, on a global scale. With the worldwide switch to remote working, this has introduced new cyber security fears and challenges, with multiple organisations still unprotected from what may come.
We don’t know what the future holds for us in 2021, and we cannot predict what will happen to UK businesses this year.
However, the team at Citadel Technology can help to prevent and minimise cyber threats, reducing the pains and worries that businesses are already experiencing during these difficult times.
Do you want to protect your business in the Citadel bubble? Send us your enquiry today: https://citadel.tech/contact-us/
Want to learn more about the importance of cyber security measures? Read other blogs by Citadel Technology: