Small Business Cybersecurity to Mitigate Supply Chain Risk

Improve Small Business Cybersecurity to Mitigate Supply Chain Risk

Has your small business recently been a direct victim of a cybersecurity attack? If the answer is no that probably means you’re doing a good job of keeping your hard drives and local systems secure and protected from cybercriminals.

But have you thought about how it could impact your business if one of your partners or suppliers was compromised? Supply chain cyber risk is the undesirable possibility that your business could be negatively impacted by security attacks on the business partners that provide information and technology services to you.

An example of this is your point-of-sale credit card processor. If their servers are hacked, your data and your customers’ payment data could be stolen by cybercriminals. Or if your firewall provider is compromised, your business’s systems could be infected with ransomware. This can all lead to compromised integrity, damaged reputations and irrecoverable financial losses to businesses and the suppliers.

Fully protecting your business from cyber criminals requires a holistic approach. It’s important to improve cybersecurity on your own systems, but you also need to choose reliable technology suppliers and business partners.

Get Started: 5 Tips for Improving Small Business Cybersecurity

Protect Your Small Business From Ransomware

Ransomware has become one of the fastest-growing malware threats to small businesses. During a ransomware attack, a hacker will claim to have locked your business’s sensitive data and demand that you pay a ransom in order to unlock the data. A 2019 prediction stated that ransomware damages would cost the world about $11.5 billion that year.

While small businesses are especially vulnerable to these attacks, you can minimize their impact by developing a backup system for all critical data and by establishing safeguards so hackers have fewer points of entry into your network.

Learn How: 5 Ways to Protect Your Small Business from Ransomware Attacks

Defend Against Business Email Compromise

It may be surprising, but email attacks like phishing and spear phishing are a part of a robust cybercriminal ecosystem. Their goal is to hack your small business email account, get as much information as they can and possibly sell your information on the dark web for easy profit.

With spear phishing, a cybercriminal will hack your email account to learn as much as they can about your business. Then, they can use this information to send your business an email with what may seem like a normal, reasonable request for financial data or other sensitive data that they can use to fraudulently exploit your business for money.

Don’t Let It Happen To You: Business Email Compromise Prevention, Response and Resilience

Protect Your Data By Working With Reliable Partners

As we mentioned before, if your technology solutions providers are attacked by cybercriminals, it could have a major impact on your small business. Magecart, for example, is a consortium of hacker groups targeting online shopping carts for businesses and has been a growing threat since as far back as 2010.

Magecart can steal customer payment information by attaching malware to your business’s online shopping cart system. The hackers will then insert malicious code into the system that is designed to forward the credit card number and associated address directly to the hacker at a fake but legitimate-sounding domain.

In order to stay protected from these kinds of attacks, you need to know how to choose a partner you can trust and one that can help you develop an action plan in the event that an attack does occur.

Stay Protected: Choose a Secure E-Commerce Provider

Stay Cybersecure With Northwest Bank Solutions

At Northwest Bank, we take small business cybersecurity very seriously. Our Business Security Center contains tools and educational resources to help prevent cyber attacks on your business. Tools like Positive Pay and our treasury services can help ensure that you and your customers are making safe and secure e-commerce transactions.

To learn more about Positive Pay or secure treasury services, contact a treasury services representative today. Find 10 more cyber security tips for your small business here.