Cybersecurity is an integral part of the smooth functioning of any modern business. It seeks to ensure that IT systems are protected and secured to minimize the risk of an attack by cybercriminals.
These attacks can come in many forms, such as phishing scams that seek to gain sensitive information such as login credentials, viruses that can stop systems from working, or ransomware that can infect a computer causing criminal gangs to ask for payment in return for the sensitive information that has been stolen or to get the systems working again.
An organization that has an effective cybersecurity department is one that recognizes the importance of protecting against the often devastating effects of a cyber attack. Such attacks can cost businesses millions of dollars, depending on the nature of the attack. This article describes three key benefits of having an effective cybersecurity strategy.
It Protects Your Business
Clearly, the most important benefit of cybersecurity is that it offers protection for your business. This is not just related to the IT infrastructure and assets but also extends to protecting the reputation and brand of a business. If a business is affected by a cyber attack, it may lose significant sums of money due to loss of information or the halting of operations.
However, the reputation of the firm in the eyes of the public will also be damaged if a successful hack takes place. This is even more damaging when customer information or sensitive data is stolen as a result of cybercrime. Today, businesses use a range of applications that communicate with each other via application programming interfaces (APIs).
If these are unsecured, they can provide an easy route into a company’s digital infrastructure. This is why IT security specialists are adept at securing API gateway to protect against intrusions. It also serves to demonstrate that as technology and applications become more sophisticated, so too must the security behind them.
It Improves Productivity
It is a fact that in the aftermath of a cyber attack, it may take time to get systems up and running again. Denial of service attacks can render applications unusable until they are free of the malware and viruses that can slow down IT systems. As a result of this, a successful attack may cause significant amounts of working hours to be lost as the recovery process takes place.
This will have a direct and negative impact on business productivity. Clearly, an effective cybersecurity strategy that is successful in defending against cybercrime and cyber attacks is one that promotes improved productivity over the long term.
It Protects Personal Information
We live in the information age, and cyber criminals recognize the true value of personal and sensitive information. By stealing information such as credit card details, vast sums of money can be gained illegally.
The theft of sensitive personal information can also result in a company being held to ransom in exchange for the return of that data or it being published on the internet, causing severe damage to an organization’s reputation and public perception. As many companies store sensitive information from their customers, it is imperative to secure this data and prevent data breaches.
