Cybercrime is lucrative; driven by the high value of personal data and sensitive company and consumer information, there’s a huge incentive for cybercriminals to up their game. Often, these threats can pose a serious challenge to your business –– particularly if you lack the resources or expertise to manage your IT in-house. The good news is that you can still take a proactive approach to protect and secure your business with the assistance of a managed IT provider.  

Data breaches are commonplace – incidents have doubled since 2018 – and increasingly advanced, and are damaging in a multitude of ways, including reputational damage, debilitating downtime, data loss, potential lawsuits, and even hefty fines. Cybercrime neither sleeps nor keeps office hours; it takes many forms and is constantly evolving to bypass security systems. If you think your antivirus software and firewall have you covered, think again. The stakes have never been higher.

To compound the problems IT departments face, government and industry regulations compliance can quickly become the added headache you don’t need. Keeping on top of laws and regulations governing data storage, data sharing, and protection of consumer information, is of ongoing concern and is certainly a challenge to manage on both regional and global levels. The repercussions of being non-compliant can be severe. 

The need for a dedicated team of IT service professionals who specialise equally in cybersecurity and regulatory compliance is clear. However, that is not the focus of your business – customer service is. Balancing security, compliance, and customer service may well divide your resources and energy in a way that leaves you ineffective, inefficient, and floundering in the wake of your competitors. Extending your IT department to manage this growing challenge may be an expensive enterprise. Scaling businesses require flexibility, and adding specialists to your payroll may create certain limitations. 

This is precisely why more and more companies are outsourcing their IT security requirements. A managed IT provider offers turnkey and customisable solutions to your cybersecurity and compliance, working in real-time, around the clock, enabling you to focus on what you do best.

Let’s look at 4 reasons you’re more cyber secure with a managed IT provider.

Easily Comply with Security Standards

The growing complexity of web-based commerce necessitates strict laws and regulations to protect the interests of consumers and investors, alike. As new risks to privacy and security arise, laws and regulations are subject to amendment. Compliance is non-negotiable. Depending on your industry, you may have a number of compliances to consider, such as PCI compliance – an information security standard for all organisations handling payment/credit cards from major card schemes. AirIT can help your organisation achieve the Cyber Essentials certification to show clients that you’re committed to working in a cyber-secure way. 

Outsourcing to a managed IT provider with a dedicated team of specialists, ensuring you are up-to-date and aligned with industry and global standards, makes compliance straightforward and hassle-free.   

Respond to Cyberattacks and IT Issues in Real-time

A delayed response to an attack or data breach increases the damage. Cyber-attacks should, if possible, be tackled in real-time –– ideally, you’ll have early detection measures in place to defend against anomalies.  Your cyber protection must be effective throughout the day and night, outside of office hours, over weekends and holidays. An accredited managed IT provider will continuously monitor your network and assets 24/7. 

As with all things, prevention is better than cure. The downtime resulting from a data breach or data loss is always costly, as are lawsuits and reputation damage if personal data is stolen for profit. The analytical expertise of a managed IT provider can be invaluable in early detection and rapid response, including the evaluation of vulnerabilities, often preventing an attack or breach before it happens. 

Mitigate Advanced and Persistent Threats

Threat mitigation begins with specialist knowledge of the multi-formed nature of the beast, not limited to malware, such as ransomware, spyware, worms, and trojan horses, and phishing attacks, which involve fraudulent messaging designed either to trick the unsuspecting into divulging personal information or to deploy malicious software, and brute-force and distributed denial-of-service attacks. Criminals are well-armed, cunning, incentivised, and persistent, if not relentless. A managed IT provider offers both specialist knowledge and tools to mitigate such threats.

Actively Block and Prevent Issues

The latest technologies, including next-generation antivirus software, are your first line of defence. Since traditional antivirus software cannot detect threats that do not introduce new files onto the system, they have all but become redundant against the plethora of modern attacks. Next-generation antivirus software offers endpoint security protection, which is cloud-based and system-centric. Analytically and predictive, artificial intelligence (AI) is self-learning. Therefore, it’s able to adapt to ever-emerging threats and block them at the outset, saving time and money on damage control, cleanups, and data retrieval. Data retrieval, if ever necessary, is another invaluable service offering of a managed IT provider.

Since the entire world has had to reimagine and redefine the conditions of operation and employment in the time of Covid-19, remote working has presented a viable and effective alternative to the conventional office model. Where there is internet access, there is a way, it seems. Oftentimes, an efficient and inexpensive way, but not without risks. A managed IT provider has the tools to monitor and secure hybrid systems and customise solutions that suit and help to optimise your specific needs, incorporating encryption technology and endpoint protection, securing all network access points, making it safe to conduct your business in the manner that is conducive to maximum productivity, without the worry associated with untested waters. 

When the full-time occupation of cybercriminals –– hackers and fraudsters –– is to breach your web defences to access the most private, confidential, and sensitive data of your clientele and business, you simply cannot afford to be underprepared. These individuals and collectives specialise in robbing and defrauding, while you work tirelessly to grow your legitimate business. Perhaps you have an IT department, but are they equipped to manage the risks and is their time and expertise better utilised elsewhere? Does your IT department have the tools and expertise to evaluate vulnerabilities, assess anomalies, and respond rapidly to threats around the clock? Damage control and disaster recovery are, for the most, unnecessary and avoidable. 

Outsourcing your cybersecurity and standards compliance to an accredited managed IT provider gives you peace of mind that you are secure and compliant while you pour your energy into what you do best: run your business.