If you are a digital business – one with systems, networks or data – you will encounter cyber risks.
When you think of cyber risks, you’ll probably think of big corporates or tech companies being hacked for their customers’ sensitive information or having ransomware downloaded so they’re denied access to their systems.
But according to some recent government data, 38% of small businesses suffered a cyber breach or attack in the last year, with the average cost of an attack over £8k.
With this in mind, it’s important for every business to assess their cyber risks and work towards dealing with any cracks and holes in their systems to avoid a potential future attack.
What cyber risks do businesses commonly face?
As the world becomes more digitally savvy, the rate and sophistication of cyber attacks has become increasingly advanced, with hackers finding progressively intelligent ways to infiltrate systems.
While every business will have different cyber risks, there are common ways that hackers find their way into a business’ systems or ways in which a business could breach certain cyber laws and rights. These include:
- Data breaches or theft of data
- Breach of GDPR
- Denial-of-Service attack
- Third-party outages
- Malware
- Intellectual property infringement
- Phishing emails
- Extortion and ransomware
- Identity fraud
What does cyber insurance cover?
Experiencing a cyber attack or breach is stressful enough, but one thing that can really help is cyber insurance. It covers the risks that come with storing and handling data when running a business.
In essence, cyber insurance supports the ramifications of a cyber attack, including compensation, fines, legal and defence costs. This can include:
- Compensation to customers as a result of a data breach
- Damages and extortion payments
- Financial loss due to downtime or business interruption
- Legal costs to settle a hacking or ransomware claim
- Compensation for fines and expenses as the result of a breach or failure to comply with GDPR or your privacy policy
- Financial losses caused by funds transfer fraud (social engineering), phone hacking, botnet attack and cryptojacking
Superscript’s cyber insurance offers access to a 24-hour breach response service, which provides you with legal, IT security and PR support, to help you deal with the incident swiftly and smoothly, which can really ease the stress of the situation.
5 tips for greater cyber security
While you can’t predict if and when a cyber attack will happen, there are plenty of things you can do to prevent one in the first place.
Here are our top 5 tips for creating a virtually hack-proof system:
- Use a third-party password manager – a hacker can crack an 8-character password with numbers, uppercase and lowercase letters in just one hour. But remembering passwords for 50 different things is often a bane of one’s life. Password managers allow you to create super long and strong passwords that are then stored securely on one platform.
- Carry out a risk assessment – looking at your business objectives and the systems you’re using will often indicate the types of cyber attacks that could potentially occur and the impact they could have. Once determined, you can decide where to implement security controls and safeguard your systems against those specific attacks.
- Train employees – the best cybersecurity in the world is useless unless everyone in your business knows what to look out for. Training should include topics such as how to spot phishing emails and insecure websites, the role of human error in data breaches and what to do if there’s a suspected attack or breach.
- Monitor vendor access – can you trust any supplier or client that you partner with to follow cybersecurity best practice? Establish how your data will be stored, what access controls they will have and the frequency of risk assessments.
- Buy cyber insurance – if you suffer a financial loss as a result of a hack or breach, your cyber insurance should cover you. At Superscript, even before you’ve made a claim, we can put you in touch with our 24-hour breach response helpline, where you’ll get help from legal, IT and PR professionals who can help you respond to the incident.
About Superscript
Clear Books has partnered with Superscript to provide flexible business insurance to our customers.
Superscript’s flexible monthly cover gives small businesses and self-employed professionals the freedom to adjust cover as things change. Get covered in 10 minutes, starting from just £5 per a month.
