There’s always a chance that your IT security gets breached. Not knowing the standard operating procedure to handle the incident is a sure way to make a bad situation worse.
Here is a sequence of steps that you should take to limit the damage.
1. First, contact people that can help, like your IT support partner or us; the faster they are aware of what’s happening, the faster they can address the hack and figure out its extent, the better served you’ll be.
2. Change all your passwords and secure your log-in processes with Multifactor Authentication. Tell everyone on your team to do the same.
3. Contact your bank, your insurance company, your attorney, a local PR company, and everyone who may have been affected by the incident.
It is important you understand that there are legal ramifications to a data breach; if critical and personal data has been compromised, you’ll have to notify the individuals in question, the attorney general, the police department, and, in some situations, the consumer reporting agencies.
4. Tell co-workers, vendors, and people you network with (including family and friends) about what’s happened. Not to look for sympathy or to share bad news, but you’re alerting people you communicate with that one of your accounts has been hacked and that the hacker may send strange messages in your name, looking for more victims.
5. Plan Now. It’s a tough pill to swallow, but this may happen again. Try to learn as much as possible about what happened and why. A better understanding of the incident will help you create an updated and improved security strategy and implement an employee cyber security training program.
Remember, the faster you act, the more you’ll be able to limit the damage.
Need help recovering from a cyber incident (or to prevent a breach from happening in the first place)? Give Meeting Tree Computer a call at (845) 237-2117. Our expert technicians are ready to take on the challenge.
