15 Data Security Tips to Protect Your Small Business

Thanks to SmallBusinessComputing.com and Jennifer Schiff for this article!

In August 2010, the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse published its latest Chronology of Data Breaches, which showed that since 2005 more than a half-billion sensitive records have been breached. Of those breached records — which contained such sensitive data as customer credit card or social security numbers — approximately one-fifth came from retailers, merchants and other types of non-financial, non-insurance-related businesses, the majority of which were small to midsized.

An equally scary statistic: approximately 80 percent of small businesses that experience a data breach go bankrupt or suffer severe financial losses within two years of a security breach, according to John Sileo, a professional identity theft consultant and speaker, who knows firsthand about the havoc a security breach can wreak on a small business.

What can a small business owner do to protect her business from a security breach? Small Business Computing spoke with two security and privacy experts and consulted the leading security and privacy sites to find out. The good news: protecting your business from a data security threat is easier than you think. It’s also much cheaper than the physical, financial and emotional cost of repairing one.

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John Sileo speaks professionally about social media exposure, identity theft and cyber crime for the Department of Defense, Fortune 1000 companies and any organization that wants to protect the profitability of their private information. Contact him directly on 800.258.8076 or visit his financial speaker’s website.

Posted by Identity Theft Speaker John Sileo in Fraud Detection & Prevention and tagged Business Identity Theft, Data Breach, Data Breach Expert, Data Breach Statistics, Identity Theft Speaker, Identity Theft Statistics, John Sileo, small business, Small Business Computing.

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3 Responses to 15 Data Security Tips to Protect Your Small Business

Jim Lippard: October 14, 2012 at 8:05 pm

What is the source for this claim? “approximately 80 percent of small businesses that experience a data breach go bankrupt or suffer severe financial losses within two years of a security breach”
Rich: September 4, 2013 at 10:08 pm

A lot of small businesses don’t take the necessary steps to keep their data safe and in the end pay for it.
Security Systems: March 12, 2014 at 5:42 pm

Great post! Been reading a lot about business security recently. Thanks for the info!