Now that computers have been part of our daily lives for a couple of decades, it’s easy to take for granted that they work just the way we want them to every minute of every day. Lightning-fast processors, broadband connections, streaming video, and real-time video capabilities make us want it all, want it fast, and want it now. That’s what makes things so exasperating when our computers slow down. They slow down our productivity at work. They limit our entertainment options. They frustrate us when we try to catch up with family and friends.
It’s easy to assume that adults are the only people affected by data breaches. After all, these breaches typically expose credit card information, social security numbers, and other details used for identity theft. Anyone under 18 does not seem like a valuable target. In reality, however, children are specifically targeted by hackers. A report published by Javelin Strategy & Research showed that over a million children had their identity stolen in 2017.
There’s a serious problem that’s growing with the shifting trends of business today, and it’s an elephant in every room that every bottom-rung entrepreneur and CEO alike wants to ignore. The problem is that businesses are becoming increasingly reliant upon third-party services to carry out their work and secure quality assurance metrics. These metrics must be met for a host of revenue- and legal-driven reasons that can lead to insurance cuts, lost business and other serious problems down the road, so of course it’s important for every manufacturer to enlist vendors for every task that the manufacturer itself isn’t equipped to handle on its own.
The rapid growth in the ecommerce industry, in many ways, is also a result of the level of confidence that people have in the online payment mechanisms. Ecommerce websites that are able to showcase their use of the best in class security features, in terms of payment processing, as well as customer data privacy, are on track for success at a scale.
There may come a time when, without tether to logic or reason, you may begin to think that the number of DDoS attacks can no longer rise because there is no more room on the internet. That the DDoS attacks that have already occurred have taken up all the space that could possibly be allotted to such damaging cyber assaults and any new attempts will simply have to be turned away.
Accounting firms and CPA’s sit at a valuable intersection between defending against cyberattacks and maintaining the type of client information that places them at greater risk of exposure to ruinous cyberattacks. This intersection gives accountants a prime opportunity to take both offensive and defensive postures against cybercrime.
Those who work in industries — whether it’s in retail advertising, corporate communications, the financial sector, or a healthcare setting such as a hospital — know how critically important it is to ensure that sensitive information remains secure.
I have talked about how I automatically backup my files from my server, but one thing I have discussed is how I backup my files from my Windows 10 desktop. Most of my important files are stored on my server, but I do have some data files, like game related files, that I would like to backup in case the hard drives in my desktop crash or begin causes data corruption in my files.
