Small businesses underestimate the cyber threats of irresponsible employee actions

Small companies (up to 50 employees) are significantly less concerned about employee activities leading to cybersecurity breaches than larger corporations. Only 36 per cent of small businesses worry about their staff’s carelessness while more than half of medium-sized and large enterprises consider it a major concern, says IT Security Risks Report 2016 by Kaspersky Lab.

Uninformed or careless staff, whose inappropriate use of IT resources can put an organization’s cyberprotection in jeopardy, can harm businesses of any size. According to the survey, employee actions are among top three security challenges that make companies worldwide feel vulnerable. More than half (61 per cent) of the businesses experiencing cybersecurity incidents in 2016 admitted that careless and uninformed employee behavior has been a contributor.

Like large corporations, small and medium-sized businesses face the challenge of managing a constantly evolving IT infrastructure, as well as accommodating BYOD trends: 74 per cent of companies reported that the amount of smartphones used for work had increased over the last three years and 71 per cent confirmed that the same is applicable for tablets. This new business reality is forcing management to pay more attention to IT security and the centralized control of potentially dangerous employee activities, even in the smallest businesses.

“In small businesses without dedicated IT personnel, it is often the case that staff have to implement cybersecurity themselves - for example, by installing free antimalware solutions with limited functionality. This poses major risks for a company because one employee’s carelessness can easily affect all data within the organization - leading to instant losses in time, clients’ data and money’. Businesses should implement solutions specifically designed for small and medium-sized businesses, with protection that any IT administrator, even with low IT skills, can easily maintain from everywhere.” said Vladimir Zapolyansky, Head of SMB Marketing, Kaspersky Lab.

Companies can protect themselves with a range of solutions dedicated to meet the specific requirements of very small, small and medium-sized business as their needs vary. The Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business product portfolio and Kaspersky Small Office Security provides multi-layered protection from well-known and emerging threats, while Kaspersky Endpoint Security Cloud, with its simple cloud-based console, provides business owners and senior non-IT management with a cost-efficient and intuitive tool to ensure cybersecurity without needing additional hardware or IT-personnel.