Each organization has its own approach to cybersecurity—some of them better than others. While many small businesses take a proactive role by working with third-party managed security service providers, others are content to employ “security through obscurity,” hoping that there will always be a bigger, more appealing target. Unfortunately, every business is a potential target for cyber criminals.

With news of another cyber attack in the headlines every other week, it’s hardly surprising that businesses of all sizes and industries are growing more and more concerned. 68 percent of organizations believe that they are “very vulnerable” or “extremely vulnerable” to a data breach.

What Are Managed Services? Managed services are the IT operations, functions, and processes that an organization chooses to outsource to a third-party external managed services provider (MSP). The organization signs a contract with the MSP known as the service level agreement (SLA) that outlines the MSP’s roles and responsibilities when monitoring and managing your IT services.

It can be scary out there in the digital world. It seems like not a week goes by where we don’t hear about phishing emails, unpatched vulnerabilities, or the latest strain of ransomware exposing the data of millions of people and businesses to the prying eyes of malicious actors. Every person and every business are potential targets with some of the largest companies in the world susceptible to the same vulnerabilities as the average Joe at their home computer (phishing being a prime example).  But all is not lost as October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month! What better time to review your cybersecurity practices, discover where you can make improvements, and seize the chance to make positive change? Consider it a fall “spring cleaning” for your digital life and business.

In many ways, Connecticut is a state in search of an identity. Could we become known as the Cybersecurity state? In Europe, some already know us that way. After a very enlightening conversation with Art House, Chief Cybersecurity Risk Officer for the State of Connecticut toward the end of last year, he was gracious enough to come back to the Kelser offices this fall for a follow up interview to give us the latest on the global cybersecurity landscape and how Connecticut fits in.

A well-known Connecticut business recently hired Kelser to hack them. Here’s how we did it. Over the past year, we’ve been working with Hoffman Auto Group, one of Connecticut’s largest auto dealers, to strengthen their cybersecurity posture and make sure their customer data is as safe as possible. After putting all the latest technology in place, it came time to address employee awareness since most cyber-attacks involve human error.

Employees are the most critical component of your organization’s cybersecurity. Mistakes made by employees cause anywhere between 25%-40% of data breaches. 

Managed security services are network security services that have been outsourced to a service provider. This provider will administer outsourced monitoring and management of security devices and systems.