Every enterprise has a moral and legal obligation to effectively protect the personal data they store as part of its business processes. If your company takes inadequate measures to safeguard this data, it can negatively impact the lives of your customers, suppliers and partners, and ruin the reputation of your brand. It can also land you in serious trouble with the UK’s data regulator, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). Fines faced by firms who have failed to secure data can be millions or 4% of their annual turnover, depending on the specific circumstances and actions involved.

Fortunately, you can minimise the risks your firm will suffer from a data breach. Read on for some key practices you should be looking to adopt:

Classify data and set permissions

The first rule of protecting information is to understand the data your firm handles. Classifying data in terms of its sensitivity allows you to ensure confidential information is never stored securely, but it also allows you to set permissions. This means that only authorised individuals will be able to access the data, making certain it is properly protected.

The best protocol to adopt is one that limits user privileges to the content they require to perform their role. Keep track of who is accessing data by requesting digital signatures to view or download files.

Ensure security software remains updated

Antivirus and anti-malware products that defend against threats are only useful if they are patched and updated to a strict schedule. Failure to do so leaves open doors for cybercriminals to exploit.

Conduct routine risk assessments

Spot-check your system and carry out comprehensive vulnerability assessments regularly. Consider all potential weaknesses in areas, from remote access for personnel to data storage, ensuring all procedures and policies are airtight. If you identify new risks to data protection, update your protocols to cover them.

Makes sure partners and vendors share your data protection standards

If you work with other firms required to handle your client data, ensure they share your data protection protocols and have appropriate security measures in place to safeguard your sensitive material.

Use cutting-edge encryption software

If there is one solution that the cybersecurity community can agree is effective in safeguarding data, it is encryption software. This process efficiently scrambles your confidential data records and private email communications so that they can only be viewed and used by authorised entities. If your email system is hacked or your company server’s defences penetrated, the data you retain on your customers, company and staff members will remain protected, allowing you to sidestep a data breach.

At Galaxkey, our secure system boasts robust multi-layered encryption that is exceptionally simple to use. With a basic drag-and-drop action, your employees can ensure both correspondence and documents, whether kept on devices or in the cloud, are unintelligible to threat actors.

If you’re looking for a comprehensive solution to protect your firm from an unfortunate data breach, get in touch today to experience a free online demonstration and a two-week trial.