Municipalities are a cybercriminal’s dream. They’re packed full of confidential information on residents and employees, offering a digital buffet of social security numbers, banking information, addresses, and more. Plus, a well-placed piece of malware in a municipal system can cause ultimate chaos - think failing traffic lights, downed payment systems, and a total disruption of city services.

Don't forget to download our ransomware prevention checklist at the bottom of the post

If your business has been hit with a ransomware attack, you’re probably asking yourself: How did this happen? What should I have done to stop this?

For many businesses, the answer isn’t clear.

In recent months, hacker group Maze began to perform cyberattacks they call a "full dump" on large industries across the U.S., with The City of Pensacola being one. Alongside them, the medical and cable industry have also reported attacks. Recently, they have extended their cyberattacks to multiple law firms across the country.

Let’s explore the connection between these two topics and how mastering one problem can help manage the other.

Over the past few years, hackers have found ways to use social media for fraud. Does this mean you should stop using social media for personal and business purposes? Absolutely not. The key is to be smart about your online practices. Cybersecurity is important across all parts of your daily life – from banking to personal email and social media.

Many companies have an incident response plan that may look great on paper but they have not tested the execution. Key stakeholders must agree on the strategy, evolve it over time and be able to implement it confidently during an incident.

Despite concerns about Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) security risks, employees over the past years have enjoyed the multiple benefits of BYOD.  Employers are unlikely to ever stop staff from bringing their own devices to work or using them remotely for work purposes.

At the most basic level, a phishing scam involves sending fraudulent emails that appear to be from a reputable person or company, with the goal of deceiving recipients into either clicking on a malicious link or downloading an infected attachment, usually to steal financial or confidential information.

The Act requires companies to provide Alabama residents with notification of a breach within 45 days of discovery. Notification is triggered by a determination of a breach that poses a risk of harm to impacted individuals.

You can’t manage what you can’t see. Even a small network generates over 250,000 logs per hours. An impossible task for a human to review. We now live in the days of sophisticated digital hackers so your concern shouldn’t be if you’re going to get hacked, but what you’re going to do when it happens.