Are SMEs Immune to Cyberattacks?

Unfortunately, No. In fact, 43% of all cyberattacks target small businesses. There are various reasons why SMEs and small entrepreneurs cannot escape cyberattacks:

1. Your Data Is Valuable To You: your data, no matter how insignificant it may seem, is critical for your organization to function. This makes you a target for ransomware attacks where cybercriminals encrypt your data and demand a ransom to restore access. Can your business survive if its IT infrastructure is paralysed?

2. You May Be Collateral Damage: you may fall victim to collateral damage. Malware can quickly spread beyond its intended target and affect anyone in its path. The WannaCry attack hit 116 countries in just four days.

3. You May Be A Stepping Stone: your organisation could be used as a stepping stone to launch an attack on a larger organisation.

4. You May Be Cryptojacked: cybercriminals may not be interested in your data, but they could use your devices to illegally mine cryptocurrency at your expense.

Cyberattacks are a growing and deadly menace against SMEs. But why does that make personal antivirus a poor choice? Is enterprise cybersecurity more effective against malware than personal antivirus?

Does Enterprise Cybersecurity Offer More Cyberthreat Protection Than Personal Antivirus?

No. K7 Security’s personal antivirus products offer the same award-winning level of cyberthreat protection as our enterprise cybersecurity solutions. K7 Threat Labs analyses hundreds of thousands of malware samples a day and distributes definition updates that provide equal protection against malware to both home and enterprise customers.

However, personal antivirus is designed to provide protection at an individual level,and is meant to be under the control of the individual. This means that the individual can turn down security settings or even uninstall the cybersecurity solution. This level of control is not suitable for a business environment.

Why SMEs Require Enterprise Cybersecurity

Every business requires cybersecurity that satisfies 3 conditions beyond the efficacy of its protection:

• It should be uniform across all users, subject to individual responsibilities that might require exemptions
• It should be under the control of the organisation and not the user. 

The organisation should have centralised monitoring and control over all the devices in its network for quick identification of issues and quick incident response

Simply put, enterprise cybersecurity adds management to threat protection. The centralised management features found in K7 Endpoint Security (K7 EPS) include:

• Management Console – The K7 console provides quick, effective, and centralised cybersecurity control over all endpoints in the organisation without requiring physical access to the endpoints
• Policies and Groups – Creating policies with specific cybersecurity settings and assigning policies to groups of users enables quick, standardised, organisation-wide cybersecurity management
• Device Control – Allowing end users to connect devices to the endpoint can result in malware ingress or data exfiltration. Device Control enables devices to be allowed or blocked based on Class ID, Device ID, and Category (e.g., USB storage devices can be blocked but USB keyboards and mice can be allowed)
• Application Control – Allowing end users to install applications may result in the installation of applications with known vulnerabilities. Application Control enables allowing/blocking the installation of applications on endpoints based on version, MD5 value, and checksum. Additionally, installed applications can be allowed to run but not be allowed to access the internet or business network
• Web Protection – News, social media, shopping, and similar sites may not be harmful but will impact productivity. The Web Protection feature enables the blocking of websites by category (such as news or shopping) through AI-enhanced URL filtering. It also supports time-based web access by allowing different levels of filtering for business hours and leisure hours
• G Suite Segmentation – SMEs that use G Suite/Google Workspace face the challenge of allowing access to official Google accounts while blocking access to personal Google accounts to maintain productivity and data security. K7 EPS provides domain-based segmentation for G Suite that does not require complex web filtering, preventing end user access to personal Google accounts or Google accounts linked to other domains
• Wi-Fi Control – Threat actors can create malicious Wi-Fi networks to launch attacks against an organisation. K7 EPS allows the endpoint’s Wi-Fi access to be blocked entirely, or allows access only to the business Wi-Fi network with In Office/Out Of Office segmentation
• Hardware Asset Management – End users may change hardware components in endpoints which may impact security and productivity. Hardware Asset Management helps identify unauthorised changes to endpoint hardware specifications
• Notifications – Admins may need to respond promptly to a cybersecurity incident. Automated notifications of cybersecurity events ensure that admins need not constantly monitor the console to be aware of events that require their prompt action

K7 Endpoint Security provides the scalability, flexibility, and reliability that SMEs require to grow their operations without worrying if their cybersecurity can keep up. Contact us to learn more about how we can help you keep your business safe from internal and external cyberthreats.