Before we know it, the year 2020 will be be ending. Due to the COVID-19 global pandemic, 2020 has been the year of remote work. Many organizations were already planning to assess the current working situation to balance work and personal life. COVID-19 simply pushed almost all organizations to allow remote work where possible and as a result added unexpected and unplanned load to their network.
It is not just the unexpected network load, allowing employees to work remote fulltime also brings in cybersecurity risks, especially for those organizations that have not invested in cybersecurity awareness training for their employees. As a result, employees fall prey to the most common attacks that can be avoided by good cybersecurity awareness training.
Remote workers can employ following pre-cautions to reduce cybersecurity risk:
- Use multi-factor authentication
- Do not share work devices with anyone (Even close family members)
- If working in a public place, ensure no one is standing behind or around you (Shoulder surfing is a real threat)
- Ensure the device is updated and patched
- Do not connect to public Wi-Fi network.
- Do not open every e-mail without first spending a minute to ensure the email is from a valid source.
- Understand that cybersecurity is everyone’s duty.
We all have to be right at all times while the bad guys only have to be right 1 time. Lets not give the bad guys this chance.
