With millions of people across the world now working remotely, businesses and employees are finding themselves adapting to the new norm of a distributed workforce. This impacts the way people work and behave online, and these behaviours can put company data at risk.

Work from home and stay secure

The coronavirus has changed the way we do business. Working from home has been introduced to reduce the COVID-19 infection rate. Here are some best practices to help you and your team to work from home and stay secure.

Ensure that you are sending emails to the correct address

Sending an email to the wrong person may seem like a harmless mistake. However, misdirected emails were the leading cause of online data breaches last year according to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). It just takes one typo or one email sent in haste for potentially sensitive company data or information to land in the wrong inbox.

Never send company data to personal email accounts

Employees may send work to their private email accounts to work on documents on their own, more familiar devices. However, while well-intentioned, data is still being exfiltrated out of the business and is potentially at risk. Additionally, businesses are at risk of breaching regulations like GDPR because, as the Data Controller, the company no longer has oversight as to where data is held.

Avoid sharing company data over public Wi-Fi

Data is at greater risk when you are not connected via the workplace networks. The result is that all services and files you are accessing have a higher risk of attack. When connecting to a service over the internet, check the address bar to ensure the protocol used is the more secure HTTPS, not HTTP.

Only use company-approved collaboration tools

When you work from home and stay safe, always consider the security of the conferencing, chat and other collaboration applications teams will be relying on. IT teams need to clearly and simply communicate to employees what sort of information can be shared on these tools. IT teams must also make it clear that staff cannot download new software or use new online tools without company approval.

Keep data secure while working from home

Protecting people and the company data they handle needs to be a top consideration for businesses during this crisis. By introducing cybersecurity practices and helping, employees understand how best to protect shared data, businesses can keep their staff safe when working from home.

How do you keep your data secure when working from home? Leave your comments below.