All in all it was a good year for SMB IT Security. It seems the problems keep coming and get more complicated, but a major theme seems to be materializing…greed. There was a time when most viruses and security issues were Pride related. Hackers from around the globe seeing what they can get away with or do. Now it seems greed and ripping people off is the top priority by a long shot. There is an upside to this, in fact there are a few:

SMB Antivirus

It used to be that antivirus software was all you needed to be relatively safe and all the bad guys wanted was to make a statement. Well, that is no longer the case, they want your money now or worse yet, your customers money. The good thing about this, is that when someone is predictable you can guard against them.

If all the bad guys just tried to deface websites or shut down systems or do other ‘vandal’ actions, then it would be hard to guard against them and even harder to justify spending money on it. Now, if their goal is to steal from you, steal your customers data, steal credit card or sensitive data or anything they can exploit for money, well it is pretty easy to know what you have that meets that need and justify spending money on it.

Cyber Vandal vs. Cyber Thief

Here are two scenarios:

1. A cyber vandal likes to take over websites and post his cyber name and a picture of some punk rock band or something like that and shut down your website for a day or so. Well, that would really stink, but the real damage is hard to calculate. We all know the media and tech communities like to post huge dollar amounts lost to hackers because systems were down, etc. Well, is that real…probably not.

2. A cyber theif likes to steal customer information so we can sell it on the black market to people that know how to make money with customer data or employee data or credit card data or just about anything. Do you think you can calculate a real damage there? Imagine notifying all your customers or employees their data was stolen! Imagine the money that will cost in actual damages and loss of reputation with them?

These days it is all about crime! So, what happened to me saying it was a good year for SMB IT Security, well like I said, once the threats become predictable it is easy to guard against them. Just ask yourself what data needs to be protected and what is the downside if it is not. In my opinion, once you know your risk, you can decide to take it or mitigate against it, but you have knowledge and that is power.

Michael Rowles

SMB IT Security & Antivirus

CopiaTECH