What kinds of Internet security concerns do small business owners have?

The biggest sources of Internet security concerns are computer viruses, which come in many forms and many types.  Some of these are spyware, which can steal sensitive information from computers and transmit them to hackers, or Trojans, which masquerade as harmless programs in order to persuade unsuspecting users to open them – upon which action they may delete files or cause severe damage to the hard drive on your computer.  The effects of computer viruses vary from slowing down the performance of an individual computer to, in a worst-case scenario, shutting down an entire network and losing sensitive information, or even incurring direct financial losses through loss of personal information such as credit card and bank account numbers.

The other major types of problems in securing a small business network are more human oriented; unauthorized access to networks, the theft or misplacing of laptop computers, or the theft of proprietary information.  These four types of small business security issues together account for some three quarters of the losses by US companies.

How do computers become compromised?

There are many ways in which small business security can be compromised by computer viruses.  Most commonly, viruses are sent via e-mails or in downloads from the Internet.  Extreme caution should therefore be used at all times when receiving any e-mails from suspicious sources or with suspicious titles.  If someone you don’t know tells you that they love you, don’t get too excited – chances are it’s a new worm or virus that’s waiting for you to open it.

Internet security becomes more difficult when there are many computers in a network – all it takes is one “weak point “ for a virus to enter the system and potentially affect every computer in the network.  Having said that, you shouldn’t get too carried away with concern.  While infections and Internet security breaches from viruses are relatively common, the damage wrought by the typical security breach is relatively low – though it can take time to clean up computers that have been infected with viruses.

What are some solutions for these concerns?

The best way of securing a small business network involves purchasing some protection in the form of firewall or anti-virus software.  These can be purchased online or via any good computer software stockist, and work best in tandem with one another.  Firewalls prevent viruses and other malicious material from getting in to your network, and anti-virus software identifies and eliminates malicious code on your system.