Contribution from freelance writer Jenny Holt
According to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, a typical organization loses 5% of revenue every year to fraud. For businesses, online fraud typically manifests itself in the form of credit card fraud, identity theft, mobile phone transaction fraud, international purchasing fraud, phishing scams, and downloaded malware that collects credit card information from customers. To protect your business and customers from this very prevalent and increasing threat, take the following steps into consideration.
1. Set up the Infrastructure for a Safe Online Workspace
You and your employees need to become experts in safe online activity. Do not assume your employees are aware of the dangers online. They are your first line of defense against online fraud and setting up a structured training process will increase their awareness of and defense against suspicious activity. This training should include guidelines for safe remote working, detection of phishing schemes, and the prevention of other scams such as identity theft. A team or individual within your company should be trained as a cyber security expert to help employees with any doubts. Employees must be encouraged to approach the cyber security expert with potential scam emails so that they can increase security awareness and update relevant training.
Another way to create a safe online workspace is to limit the risks at work. Keep all software updated and restrict access to network systems to essential IT staff only. Also, prevent or limit the use of removable media storage as this increases the risk of downloadable malware.
2. Install Machine Checks
There are many automated tools developed to catch what a human eye may miss. The installation and constant updating of spam filters and malware detection software will help to prevent attacks that slip through the human check. There is also machine-learning software that analyzes all online transactions and identifies buying and behavioral patterns across customers. This software will alert you of any suspicious behavior that requires further attention.
3. Protect against Credit Card Fraud
Business owners are responsible for ensuring all customer payment details are secure but online transactions come with the risk of fraudulent activity. Credit card fraud prevention is something all businesses, especially those in ecommerce, must be vigilant about. NoFraud was built to tackle credit card fraud head on through our purpose-built platform. By sitting between your site and the payment gateway, real-time fraud prevention brings down the percentage of fraudulent transactions significantly.
4. Advanced Encryption and Data Protection
Encrypting data makes it unreadable to intruders and renders the information useless if stolen. This protects data sent between a business and its customers such as bank numbers, social security numbers, credit card numbers, and any other confidential information.
5. Perform Security Audits
Consult a third-party professional to conduct annual audits on your network security systems. Their analysis will identify your vulnerabilities and determine which areas need improvement so that you can protect your business.
