Cybersecurity definitely needs to be a point of emphasis for any business who relies on technology, after all if you suffer a data breach, it can have a direct impact on the way your business is viewed by potential customers or it can even have an effect on the way that you are able to operate. In order to keep your business secure online you need to depend on your staff. Like it or not, they are a major part of your business’ cybersecurity system and if they aren’t trained properly and understand their role, your business is low-hanging fruit for hackers.
Unfortunately, security can be problematic for your staff. Consider for a minute that even if they do understand the role they play in your cybersecurity, that even the most experienced employee may find it difficult to keep up with all the computer security requirements that your IT administrator has set up. This phenomenon is called security fatigue. Today, we will talk a little bit about what causes it and how you can do your best to keep your staff from experiencing it.
Security Fatigue is Real
According to the National Institute of Standards in Technology (NIST) a majority of those served in a poll admitted to having some type of security fatigue. Basically, there is so much made about cybersecurity that they can’t keep it straight; or, worse yet have become ambivalent about it due to the sheer number of security protocols they are asked to navigate. Either way, employees and vendors that have access to your business’ IT infrastructure need to actively be doing their very best to help keep your organization’s computing infrastructure and data safe. Doing things that put technology at risk include:
- Getting successfully phished - Those people who are dealing with security fatigue generally don’t pay mind to what they click on. In this day and age, that can be extraordinarily bad for the organization they work for. Over 90 percent of today’s cyberattacks start with a phishing message of some sort so if you have staff that routinely falls for these tactics, you need to do something to ensure those people know how dangerous phishing is.
- Poor password hygiene - People who care about cybersecurity understand the role that their passwords play in it. Since most accounts require passwords as a part of their login strategy, using the same passwords in multiple accounts can be a serious problem. About four-in-five people admit to using a password on multiple accounts. This is just unacceptable for work-related accounts.
- Using software that doesn’t have active support - If you don’t pay any mind to your cybersecurity, you probably won’t pay attention to updates surrounding your software. Many types of software are routinely updated by their developers and some just so happen to be on users to update (think internet browsers). For the people suffering security fatigue, they don’t pay any mind that their OS or browser is out of support and that can have some serious repercussions for your business as a whole.
Remedies for Security Fatigue
The best way to keep people from dealing with security fatigue is to have a strategy in place that takes into account both viewpoints. Obviously, network and cybersecurity are essential parts of your workplace computing strategy, but you have to understand that people don’t like having every little issue brought up every day. It’s a balancing act to be sure, but you will want to get your people to use password managers, which will encrypt all the passwords and make it easier for your organization’s staff to easily use secure passwords.
Another way to help with the overwhelming security posture is to invest in a single sign-on solution. There are plenty of solutions out there today that allow your staff to have one username and password. Through the use of multifactor authentication these solutions work to simplify the authentication process, while also having a comprehensive tool designed to keep unauthorized users off your network.
If you would like to learn more about security fatigue and some of the security solutions and strategies Voyage Technology uses to keep our business and our clients secure, give us a call today at 800.618.9844.
