Welcome the the fifth and final week of National Cyber Security Awareness Month!
The last topic we will address is “Building the Next Generation of Cyber Professionals”. This immediately brings to mind jobs like webmaster, networking technician, server manager, or database manager, but in reality, many people getting jobs in the next few years will be cyber professionals whether they realize it or not. Working with computers and with electronic data, in the form of spreadsheets, documents, emails and other digital formats, will be large parts of many people’s daily tasks. Everyone that does this will need to be aware of the importance of security and data integrity. With that in mind, here are some tips and reminders for working as a de facto cyber professional.
- Use good passwords and protect them. Don’t write them down and stick them under the keyboard, and don’t use birthdays or pet names or “12345678”.
- Make sure critical documents are backed up on a regular schedule. Check with the IT team (there will be one, even if it is one person) to verify this.
- Don’t put confidential or proprietary documents on personal devices like tablets and phones. This is a potential breach and may damage your employer and/or cost you your job.
- Understand office/job processes clearly. Social engineering tactics fail if everyone knows how to properly conduct business.
- Request that office employees get cyber security awareness training upon hiring and at least every other year, if not more frequently
Cyber security is a shared responsibility. Understanding that fact and acting on it will make the Internet and our digital, connected world, safer.
We hope that you have enjoyed the 2015 National Cyber Security Awareness Month topics this year and as a result you are more aware of the potential issues surrounding our shared, connected, digital lifestyles.