FOCUS CYBERSECURITY
Over three quarters (85 per cent)
of Chief Information Security
O icers (CISOs) admit having sacrificed
cybersecurity in an e ort to enable
employees to work remotely when the
pandemic hit. According to the 2020
Remote Work from Home Cybersecurity
report 84 per cent of the workforce
are planning to continue to work from
home a er lockdown and at least half
of business leaders will allow them to
do so. For cyber criminals, this means a
larger array of potential targets, and for
cybersecurity specialists a much wider
surface area to protect.
The rapid shi to home o ices and the
32 MARCH 2021
changing working environment has taken its
toll on cyber protection. According to a study
by IBM, 45 per cent of employees admit having
received no new training before going remote,
making it easier for cyber criminals to attempt
a data breach and compromise valuable
information.
With more employees working remotely,
more devices are connected outside of the
secured corporate network. That means
corporations no longer have control over the
infrastructure their sta use for work. People
may work on their personal computers,
neglect digital security requirements,
connect through unsecured Wi-Fi hotspots
and therefore grant bad actors’ access to the
internal business networks. And if you had 3,000
employees before, now you have 3,000 sites to
look a er.
Cybersecurity risks posed by remote work can
be classified in three key areas: people, places,
and technology. To prevent cyber threats, each
of them has to be addressed in every home
o ice. Below are the five of the most vulnerable
areas to evaluate when setting up a safe and
protected network connection for home
working.
FIVE WEAK CYBERSECURITY
LINKS OF THE HOME OFFICE
Multiple personal devices. Every internetconnected
gadget is a potential hazard as
hackers can utilise its vulnerabilities to gain
access to personal or business networks.
At home, employees may use a variety of
electronic devices for work purposes: they
could check workplace chats on phones,
write emails on personal tablets, and access
cloud services on a laptop. And even if the
latter has su icient protection, the former
two may lack security layers needed to
establish a completely secure connection.
HOME GUARD Insecure connections and unpatched software risk compromising company
data. Juta Gurinaviciute Chief Technology Offi cer at NordVPN Teams discusses
the main home offi ce network risks for business