I went to the Toronto Board of Trade this week for a fascinating event on IT security. The authors of the Rotman-Telus Joint Study on Canadian IT Security Practices were presenting their results and they spoke about some things that all small business owners should pay attention to.

Their results were based on nine focus groups across Canada with 50 participants and a survey of 600 other IT security professionals.

Most alarmingly, they found annual losses from network security breaches have almost doubled from their last study, increasing to $834,149. That’s based on an average of 11.3 security breaches a year.
What’s this mean for small businesses? You are vulnerable and you need to ensure your network is properly secured.

One of the presenters at the event – Christopher Burgess from Cisco – said: “Hackers are like water. They will follow the path of least resistance.”

That means that the businesses who are the easiest targets are the ones that will get hit – even if you have a small, unsophisticated network. And the impact of security breaches will hit your bottom line hard.

The study found that the biggest cost of a security breach is damage to your company’s brand or reputation. Other costs are:

• Lost time due to disruption
• Lost customers
• Regulatory actions
• Litigation

The study also looked at the top security issues of companies. The top 5 things businesses are worried about are:

1. Disclosure or loss of confidential data
2. Compliance with Canadian regulations and legislation
3. Business continuity and disaster recovery
4. Loss of strategic corporate information
5. Employee understanding and compliance with security policies

What’s the best way to secure your business network? We’re going to be talking about this in detail at our Reboot & Refocus Boot Camp on October 20. If you’re concerned about the security of your network, you should attend.

Go to www.rebootandrefocus.com now to register! Space is limited.