If there was a security breach in your office, would you know what to do? Cybersecurity is a serious threat to all businesses, no matter how big or small, yet most companies would have no idea what to do or how to recover from a security breach. It might be the perfect time to have a safety and security policy in place to protect you and your business’ information from theft. Here is how you can keep your information protected and how to handle a security breach if one should happen.

No matter how safe your business is being to protect your important information, you could always be doing more. But how? If you’re a small business, you probably don’t have the funds to secure the company as a larger business would, but you don’t have to have a lot of money to protect what you’ve worked so hard to build. Some ways you could protect yourself and your business in a data breach are:

• Store your customer data in an encrypted database.
• Make sure you have multiple levels of passwords for any place on your computer with customer data on it; change these passwords regularly.
• Install malware detection software on all servers and workstations and check that all firewalls are up and secure.
• Consider background checks regularly on all your employees handling customer data.
• Have your attorney update the terms and conditions to hold you harmless in the event of a security breach.
• Do an IT security health check, like this one from AVG.

Small businesses are a target for security breaches and everything from staff records with social security numbers and salary information to banking details to customer account information could be at risk. Do your employees understand online risks? Does your business have a plan in place to deal with a security breach?

If you have already fallen victim to a security breach, you may immediately try to find someone to blame. It’s easier to find someone to blame for anything than to figure out why it happened or what could’ve been done to prevent it. When there is a security breach, there are more important things you should be worrying about than who targeted you and succeeded. If you’ve been hacked, or if you are ever hacked, ask yourself these questions instead of trying to find someone to blame:

• How did this happen?/How did the attacker get in? Do you have network visibility? To ensure you do, make sure security managers can see every device connected, every authorized user, and how secure the connected devices are. This will give them a better chance of finding the weakest link.
• What was stolen? Figuring out what was stolen and how long ago it was stolen is crucial especially when it comes to customer data.
• How can I fix the damage? Fixing the damage caused is much more important than placing blame on anyone. If you want good visibility, you must be speedy in the correction of the damage. The faster you act on fixing it, the faster it can be repaired.
• What can I learn from this? Security defenses must progress intelligently, automatically, and quickly to prevent it from happening again. If you make it more difficult to hack into again, hackers will move on to easier targets.
• Is the threat actually gone? It’s understandable to put all your time and energy into stopping the attack and fixing the damage, but ensure the attacker(s) didn’t leave other hidden ways to get back into the system later when everything has calmed down.

By asking yourself these questions after a security breach, you can fix the problem and prevent it from happening again. Keep your information and your customer’s information safe. Have a plan by considering the tips above for how to protect your data, and if a security attack does happen to you, ask yourself the above questions to quickly solve the problem and move on to important business.