Identity Theft and Phishing

Most people today are aware that they need to protect themselves from identity theft, phishing, and other scams that run rampant online. A lot of businesses, however, are unaware how vulnerable they are to these same crimes. Even if you take precautions, your employees – and even the state offices that hold your business information – can increase your vulnerability. Discover some eye-opening information about business identity theft and phishing.

Identity thieves are taking advantage of the fact that so much more business is done online these days. (Item #1) If your employees have access to confidential information that can be used for identity theft they may decide to use this information themselves to make purchases, or obtain other lines of credit – and you could be liable. (Item #2) In many states, the business information held by state governments is no more secure – and as easily edited – as Wikipedia. (Item #3)

Many small and medium-sized business owners feel their businesses are too small to be valuable to identity thieves; that’s not how a criminal sees it. (Item #4) Businesses today should not only be aware of the risks of business identity theft, but should also take steps to try to catch it as early as possible to avoid the damaging consequences. (Item #5) Your Web site could be host to illegal activity right now… or maybe you’ve been hijacked. (Item #6)

Business Continuity and the Economy

Hurricanes, tornados, flash flooding, fires, power outages... all of these can close your doors for periods from a couple of hours to several days. Over the years, business continuity studies have shown that companies that experience a computer outage or other disruption lasting more than 10 days will never fully recover financially and half of them will be out of business within five years. Given this information, and with the current state of the global economy, investing in a disaster recovery/business continuity plan may be the only way to ensure you’ll still be around when the economy recovers.

Unless you’re expecting not to be around next week, continuity planning should still be on your agenda. (Item #1) Bring the issue of business continuity management higher up the boardroom agenda and prepare for the potential fall outs from political instability, social unrest and economic meltdown. (Item #2) A modular approach to continuity planning could be the answer in a slow economy. (Item #3)

If you want to avoid high disaster recovery costs, providing your business a dependable safety net will do you a lot of good. (Item #4) A strong business continuity environment provides assurance to the organization’s executive management that in the event of a disaster, the organization is in a superior position to survive. (Item #5)  Unsettled economic conditions can cause numerous business continuity challenges. (Item #6)

Meetings & Events

If you fall into the trap of thinking nothing can go wrong with your event, remember Murphy’s Law. Because it is true that anything that can go wrong will... at any time. You may have been lucky up to now, but that luck won’t hold forever if you haven’t done everything possible to mitigate your risk and planned for something going wrong. Take a look at this week’s articles for some good hints on what to do to help prevent Murphy from prevailing.

Do you have a plan B for each of your events? (Item #1) Explore two of the vital 10 steps to safety. (Item #2) Do you have these five aspects of event safety under control? (Item #3)

Here are steps you can take to keep your attendees from overindulging and to reduce liquor-liability risk. (Item #4) Read about the best solutions to avoid branding or public image risk and payment risk. (Item #5) If you’re not already taking the steps in this checklist, you should be. (Item #6)

Cyber Crime

Cyber crime covers a broad area, everything from hacking government web sites to cyber terrorism, but some of the most common cyber crimes are committed against businesses and individuals. Many organizations simply have not made cyber safety a priority. If you read the articles below, you’ll see that this should be moved way up the “to do” list, and you’ll also find some ways you can begin to protect yourself against cyber crime.

Cybergeddon is a huge threat facing us today. (Item #1) Cybercrime is among some of the most insidious—and profitable—of crimes. (Item #2) Social media networks are playing a role in cybercrime. (Item #3)

Cyber crimes can be thwarted through a comprehensive prevention and detection strategy. (Item #4) Small businesses must create a culture of security among their staff/clients/customers. (Item #5) We now face organized attempts to steal intellectual property in whatever form it may take. (Item #6)