Running a business is a long-term commitment that requires dedication and continuous growth. You need a range of skills which consist of communicating effectively, managing robust workloads, networking, and being able to strategize effectively. A key aspect of running a successful business is being able to build trust and ensure security for your business. One of the ways that you can do this is by ensuring that any client data, as well as yours and your employees’, is secure and difficult to access. If you’re looking for ways to improve your security and better handle sensitive information, you’ll find a few tips you may find useful below.
Limit the Number of People with Access
When dealing with sensitive information or data, it’s imperative that you limit the number of people who have access to this information. It could mean assigning specific people to access this information and ensuring they have to go through a series of security measures before gaining entry. The reality is, the more people that have access to data, the harder it would be to identify who may be responsible in the case of a data breach. For this reason, you should only give your employees access to information related to their job roles. Restrictive data permissions are usually the best security measure on those premises. Additionally, another tip for keeping your information secure is rethinking policies that enable employees to bring their own devices to work for work purposes. This is because lost devices can pose a major risk to companies so avoiding it altogether may be the best alternative for security reasons.
Avoid Storing High-Value Data
Aside from the mentioned, another key way of handling sensitive information is avoiding storing high-value data if possible. If you have Office 365 especially, you should research the Office 365 DLP best practices when it comes to high-value data. For example, certain types of data based on your company’s compliance posture aren’t permitted to be stored in Office 365. Sticking to such practices helps protect you from sensitive information leaking or data breaches. On that note, you should do an audit to see what types of sensitive information you are currently storing on your databases and which you need to remove. Some examples of sensitive data include social security numbers, credit card numbers, salaries, and account numbers.
Build Awareness
One of the best methods for handling sensitive information is to build awareness in your business. It’s imperative that you highlight and emphasize the importance of following the appropriate practices when it comes to sensitive data. Seeing as many times data breaches happen by accident, training employees on how to encrypt data, generate strong passwords, avoid malware, and properly file and store data is essential.
Handling sensitive information in your business in the right way is critical. It helps build trust and helps people feel secure knowing that their data is safe with you. Taking the right precautions to ensure security is key. The tips above will be useful next time you’re looking for ways to handle sensitive information.
