Most office employees will continue to work from home at the beginning of 2021, using their work computer while they are often distracted with household interruptions/emergencies, children, pets, shopping, streaming sports, news, movies, etc. Many times, employees don’t have immediate access to their own personal computer, and so the computer issued by work is often used for personal purposes. All company issued devices will likely be used for personal use at some point. As a business, you want to lessen the risk this poses.
Why is this happening? Employees are often issued a laptop by their employer. Many times, this employee doesn’t have their own personal laptop, and so this work laptop becomes the employee’s “hybrid” work/home laptop.
Beginning steps: As a business owner and company, you want to decide and define what an employee can or cannot do on their work computer – and make this clear to employees with an IT security policy to follow.
Contact Revamp Cybersecurity today to see how we’ve helped hundreds of companies successfully navigate through situations like this.
Some of the things we’ve seen:
- Employees looking for free sports and entertainment/movie streaming websites (NFL, NBA, MLB, free tv/movies) will often visit malicious websites because they offer illegal streaming sports content for free.
- Unfortunately, visiting these types of websites also increases the risk for ransomware and viruses.
- Employees will often look for bargains or coupons before they make purchases. Again, while they are rushing to find the best deal, they may end up at a malicious website.
- Lastly, many employees access their personal email accounts on the work computer – either by mistake or because it saves time, etc. This puts their work computer and company at a greater risk of being exposed to a malicious link or phishing email sent to the personal email account without proper email protection or filters, etc.
If you are issuing employees laptops or devices, you should assume they will use it for personal use at some point (i.e. letting their kids or visitors use it, doing personal tasks, personal taxes, uploading personal photos, file sharing, etc.).
As a business, you want to control these actions as much as possible.
Remember, companies need to issue employees computers and devices to work effectively, but it also creates risks for your company. The key is to balance company security and personal employee user needs and tendencies.
Contact Revamp Cybersecurity today to see how we’ve helped hundreds of companies successfully navigate through situations like this.
Book a Free Consultation: https://calendly.com/revampcybersecurity
Ask Us Anything for FREE! https://revampcybersecurity.com/ask-a-cybersecurity-expert
Have a Safe & Secure New Year 2021!
https://revampcybersecurity.com/
Get Secure, Stay Secure
