What should you look for from your cyber security provider?

No business can ignore the need for effective cyber security measures and solutions. Every single company, no matter their size, vertical, location, service, or product, is at constant risk of being a target for a cyber-criminal. Choosing the best cyber security partner for your business requirements, needs careful consideration.

Why would my business need to work with a cyber security partner?

Cyber criminals aren’t picky, they’ll target any company, in fact that’s exactly what they do - randomly attack as many businesses as they can - it improves their odds of being successful. If you are a victim, the chances are that you weren’t targeted at all, your business isn’t ‘special’ neither was it ‘chosen’ to be attacked, the attack was launched on thousands of businesses, and yours just had weak defences.

Gov.uk confirmed that in 2022, 39% of UK businesses have identified a cyber-attack, and 31% of businesses and 26% of charities estimating that they were attacked at least once a week! The most common attack, with 83%, was a phishing attack, a simple email, designed to trick the receiver into clicking a malicious link.

It's not ‘if’ you’ll be a victim of a cyber-criminal, it’s when and with 60% of SME’s closing withing 6 months of suffering an attack, protecting your business has to be taken seriously.

So, how can you better protect your business and your data?

There is no one-solution that will defend your business as there are so many ways a cybercriminal could attack you. You could experience an attack due to an Internal threat, for example – a disgruntled or careless employee has just as much potential to cause your business mayhem as a cyber-criminal does.

Your business could be hit by a ransomware attack, where your defences are breached, your data encrypted and held for ransom by cyber criminals, or a Password Attack, where your main server password is breached. There’s also the chance of being hit with a Man-in-the-Middle Attack, where your communications are eavesdropped by a cyber-criminal with malicious intent, or a DOS attack, where your networks and servers are flooded with traffic to exhaust bandwidth and resources.

By employing an internal IT/Cyber Security resource, your business will be much better protected, but effectively managing your business cyber security needs is a huge task for one resource to manage. You’ll also need to assess the best cyber security solutions and providers for your needs, the cost of these solutions, and the huge range of programs and services to choose from. It can take time to assess which solutions are best for your business and your processes.

These are just some of the reasons that you should consider working with a proven cyber security partner.

How can you choose the cyber security partner that best suits your business needs and threats?

 There are 5 things that you should consider and assess your prospective cyber security partners against, they are:

Credentials

Your chosen cyber security partner must be well-versed, well established and accredited. They need to have attained Cyber Essentials (Plus preferably), be ISO 27001 and ISO 9001 accredited, adhere to GDPR and relevant compliance and be IASME Certified. The staff you will be working with should also have relevant cyber security training and qualifications.

Experience

Alongside relevant impeccable training and certification, your chosen security provider needs to demonstrate that they have longevity, capability and knowledge of your sector, business size and setup. You’ll also need evidence that they have a dedicated team with plenty of relevant experience and training.

Cyber Security Culture

Leading by example, your chosen provider’s internal processes should be in line with best cyber security practices, and their staff regularly tested and trained. The service desk should ensure security is key in all communications and be integral to the overall security for not only your security, but that of their employer.

Partners, Vendors, Solutions and Best Practice

By working with the best-in-class cyber security solution providers and services and by employing effective cyber-hygiene to all aspects of their own business, you can rest-assured that your chosen partner is doing all it can to deliver its clients with best cyber security solutions. 

Honesty, Integrity and SLA’s

Your provider should be open and transparent, and their motivations for the services and solutions they recommend should be in line with your needs and the budget agreed. You shouldn’t feel pressured, be dealing with overzealous salespeople, sense that you’re being bombarded by jargon or pushed to consider solutions that aren’t fully explained. With agreed Service Level Agreements in place, you and your IT provider will be able to better manage your service.

You should be assured that your IT partner sincerely cares about your business.

 The team at Method IT are dedicated to our client needs, we drive customer service perfection with CSats (Client Satisfaction Scores), consistently scoring above 99% with an average time-to-answer a client ticket standing at just over 5 seconds, we’re confident that your business and teams will be in great hands.

How can you get started?

If you are interested in working with a Cyber Advisor Assured Provider, such as Method IT, and getting certified with Cyber Essentials, you can find more information in our detailed, free eBook. We can advise on what needs to be done technically in order to ensure you meet the standards of Cyber Essentials. Once you’ve made your decision, or simply need more information about the certification, you can contact us.