Maintaining your online security is absolutely essential to running a good business, and although it can be a challenge to stay on top of the various, ever-growing list of threats, there are simple steps you can take to stay ahead of the game.
Firewall Testing
Your system’s firewall is your first line of defence against cyber-attack. The firewall is basically a filter designed to catch suspicious, unknown or overtly dangerous interactions between your website or services and a potential threat.
To ensure that your firewall is operating optimally, you need to ensure not only that it is up to date with the latest software, but also that you test it regularly to make sure that it is still appropriate for your security needs.
There are a number of tests you need to conduct, on a regular schedule, including:
- Port and services scans
- File-sharing test
- Common ports test
- All Ports and Services test
- Messenger Spam test
- Browser Disclosure test
To test your firewall, you can use a number of free online tools, including ShieldsUP (link to https://www.grc.com/shieldsup ) which will allow you to run several of the aforementioned tests.
Firmware upgrades
Firmware is the software that operates inside your hardware devices such as routers, laptops, desktops, mobile phones etc. that controls how your system behaves and functions.
As part of your overall security health, your firmware plays a major role in interacting with firewalls and other security software to ensure that threats are identified, mitigated and reported.
It is thus essential to keep your device’s firmware up to date. Ordinarily, your firmware’s settings will notify you of a new update – please don’t ignore these messages, it could be very costly!
For guidance and advice on your Firewall, Firmware and general system security, contact one of our friendly experts today.