New Study Shows That Cybercrime Has Doubled in the UK Within the Last 5 Years

Cybersecurity experts from Beaming have been gathering data about cyber attacks on organizations in the UK for the last five years. Sadly, they concluded that more and more companies are failing at preventing cyber attacks every year. They have also discovered that big companies are no longer the primary target. Research reveals that small and medium organizations are being attacked nearly twice as much as they were in 2015. Thus, all companies, no matter what size they are, should take precautions that would allow them to protect themselves against increasing cyber threats. Further in the text, we discuss the Beaming report's findings and the biggest 2020 cybersecurity trends that we believe all companies should know about. We also provide cybersecurity tips that can help organizations prevent cyber attacks better.

One of the most significant findings in the Beaming report was that hackers no longer concentrate on large companies. The research revealed that the number of small businesses that reported falling victim to cybercrime has doubled from 28% in 2015 to 62% in 2019. The amounts of attacks on micro and solo organizations have almost doubled, which is why being small can no longer be an excuse for poor cybersecurity practices within a company. Specialists say that the risk of being attacked by hackers increases by 60% when a business hires its very first employees. Smaller companies might be easier targets because they often invest less in cybersecurity than a large organization.

Large companies should not lose their guard either. If anything, they should invest in cybersecurity even more as attacks on large companies have also almost doubled in the last five years. The top threats for large companies in 2019 were phishing (38%), malware (31%), and social engineering (25%). Small and medium businesses were most vulnerable to phishing, malware, and data breaches. As for Solo and micro organizations, they struggled with protecting themselves against phishing, malware, and password attacks.

Even with the knowledge of top threats, companies are still failing at preventing cyber attacks. Why is that? According to the Beaming report, over 60% of UK businesses take minimal precautions to ensure cybersecurity. Such companies rely on antivirus software and routers that offer only basic protection. Moreover, the study revealed that while more and more companies take measures against cyber attacks, the growth is minimal. For instance, in 2015, 30% of questioned companies were using a firewall, and five years later, this figure has grown only by 7%. The situation is even worse with employee education, which many specialists believe to be vital in preventing cyber threats. The amount of organizations that educate their employees about cyber threats and introduce cybersecurity tips has risen only by 2% in the last five years, from 20% in 2015 to 22% in 2019.

How can companies protect themselves from cyber attacks?

Specialists say that it is not an easy task to prevent cyber attacks because they keep evolving. Not to mention, there are no tools or services that could ensure complete safety against hackers. However, there are precautions that companies can take to minimize the risk of falling victims to cyber attacks. Without further ado, we present cybersecurity tips that every company who wants to protect itself from cyber attacks should begin with.

Set a password policy

Cybersecurity specialists keep warming everyone how risky it is to use weak passwords, and yet 123456 was still the most breached password in the UK last year. Sadly, weak passwords is not the only problem, as many users also reuse the same combination on multiple accounts. Needless to say, hackers only need to breach one of the accounts, and all the rest of them that use the same password would become compromised.

Thus, using a strong password for multiple accounts is no better than using unique but weak passcodes. This is why specialists recommend setting a strict password policy for all employees so that they could not use weak passwords for work accounts. It is best to use combinations that are both unique and strong. If your employees find it challenging to create or remember such passwords, you could get a dedicated password manager like Cyclonis Password Manager to generate and memorize strong passwords for your employees.

Educate employees about cyber attacks

We cannot stress enough how important it is that your employees would be aware of different cyber threats and cybersecurity tips to help identify and prevent attacks. Human error was just as big of an issue in 2015 as it is today. According to the report we discussed earlier, 37% of breaches in 2015 and 36% of breaches that happened in 2019 were due to human error.

Besides educating employees about strong passwords, phishing attacks, and data breaches, companies should also ensure that only the ones working with specific data or a system would have access to it. Plus, it is crucial that employees who leave the organization would lose their access to sensitive information and company systems. As you see, some breaches happen not because an employee makes a mistake but because he may have malicious intent.

Specialists from Kaspersky named the growth of the so-called insider market as one of the biggest 2020 cybersecurity trends. It is when hackers offer money to employees if they agree to provide sensitive information about their colleagues, superiors, and so on. Therefore, ensuring that employees cannot access sensitive data that they do not need and tracking how they use the information they can access is just as crucial as teaching your staff cybersecurity tips.

Remove vulnerabilities

Your company’s computers should have no vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers. To ensure this, cybersecurity experts advise keeping all software and hardware up to date. While some updates and patches are easy to install, a company might still need someone responsible for keeping everything up to date and ensuring that everything runs smoothly.

Another way to strengthen your employees’ devices is to employ antimalware and VPN tools. A reputable antimalware tool can guard a computer against various malicious applications, while a VPN tool can ensure secure connections for your employees that might need to work from home, use cloud tools, etc. If you want to learn more about how VPN software could benefit your organization, you could continue reading here. Moreover, researchers believe that using AI (Artificial Intelligence) in security tools is also one of the biggest 2020 cybersecurity trends. So far, such tools look very promising, so if a successful cyber attack on your company could result in devastating consequences, specialists advise looking into antimalware software with AI technologies.

To conclude, it is time for businesses to realize that hackers are not going anywhere. On the contrary, they are constantly looking for weaknesses and ways to improve their techniques. Thus, it is clear that the amount of cyber attacks will not decrease until more companies take the necessary security measures. Employing basic cybersecurity tips will not do. Therefore, we advise you not to wait any longer and make cybersecurity your organization’s priority today.