The right time to think about how to protect your company from a data breach is before one occurs. There are any number of preventative measures you can take to protect your business, but none of them are helpful after a breach occurs. Information security training for your new hires and refreshers for your long-term staff should be a critical part of your business strategy. Make sure your team has the tools and the information they need to succeed.
Building a Security Culture
The increase in cyber security concerns calls for an increase in cyber security awareness in the corporate sector. But it also calls for a strong understanding of how to manage documentation and when necessary when and how to dispose of it. Best practices such as these should become second nature to your staff and should be woven in to the workplace culture as a whole.
It takes focus and effort every day to make sure you and your employees are making the right decisions when it comes to your digital security. But a strong security culture can help support that effort more than any software program or un-guessable password. Sharing the knowledge needed to educate employees about the risks involved with improper disposal, cloud storage, data security, and malware protection, partnered with taking the necessary precautions to protect the security of the company is the first step toward building a strong culture of security.
Make Sure Data Security in Built into Onboarding
Everyone learns slightly differently. The goal of a security focused onboarding process is not to enforce uniformity in the learning styles but instead to deliver a great first impression and provide other relevant information. You will have the most success in grabbing and retaining the attention of a large audience if the onboarding process incorporates flexibility. This could mean having multiple different delivery mediums such as in person sessions, online information, onboarding videos, and group sessions versus a more personalized session. Different people will find different parts of the content more appealing to them. It is important that the delivery mechanism is tailored towards that and lets employees go at their own pace. But all of them should understand the key elements of your security procedures.
Rethink Document Management
Sensitive information comes in many formats. Whether it’s digital files stored in the cloud or an old fashioned paper archive. The document management process may be different for each. But the overall idea is the same. The sensitive information must be protected throughout the disposal process to avoid any unnecessary exposure or risk. To start, shredding of paper files is a common practice. For companies with more documents, enterprise document disposal might be a better fit.
It’s worth noting that a simple shredding is not always enough. To completely protect the information contained within the documents that were destroyed, pulping or other methods might be needed. Shredded documents can be reconstructed. Make sure you are working with a high quality document management company who takes on the responsibility. Not to mention, with so many businesses testing out remote work capabilities, not everyone has easy access to the company shredder.
Emphasize Proper Disposal
Destruction of hard copy documents is only effective if the digital files associated with those documents are also destroyed properly. Simply deleting the files is not enough. Until that space has been written over, the possibility of recovering data still exists. Ensure personal information is not easily accessed by “shredding” individual files on the hard drive. There are a variety of software programs which can shred files. Do the research you need to know which one is right for you.
The security and convenience of working with a document management partner protects your company while prioritizing customer security. Call today to talk with a representative.
