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BUSINESS Friday 22 March 2019
A25

Vulnerable to attack: Businesses should boost cyber defenses

By JOYCE M. ROSENBERG pened during a hurricane
Associated Press and the company was shut
NEW YORK (AP) — When down for 10 days; Marose
cyberthieves attacked couldn’t get any help.
Empire Industries’ com- Marose now guards his
puter network, technology information closely. “It
manager Rich Shemanskis changed the way I do busi-
could see files in the pro- ness going forward,” Ma-
cess of being infected by rose says.
malicious software. The attack on Amanda
“We were looking at the Naor’s website showed her
network, and I noticed it, why it’s critical to back up
and another guy noticed content and data. Naor,
it. We’re looking at the who has a photography
files and watching them business in Los Angeles,
change,” Shemanskis re- tried to log into her site
calls about the attack early last year but her pass-
three years ago. word was rejected. Techni-
Shemanskis told staffers cians at the company that
to quickly shut down their hosted her site found that
PCs, which helped limit the someone had hacked in
malware’s spread, but the and changed the pass-
company did lose about word. Naor created a new
a day’s worth of work. This Feb 23, 2019, photo shows the inside of a computer in Jersey City, N.J. Associated Press password, but a week later
The saving grace for the of Education and Human $10,000 and two clients. weak security — it didn’t was again locked out and
Manchester, Connecticut, Development whose ex- Marose realizes that giving use two-factor authenti- her website was complete-
manufacturer of build- pertise includes cyberse- the password to someone cation, which requires a ly disorganized — pictures
ing materials was it had curity. Cyberthieves use else was a mistake. But the temporary passcode in and text were jumbled
backed up most of its files. increasingly advanced theft was made easier by addition to a password. haphazardly. She had no
A cyberattack that leads technology and develop the website company’s Moreover, the theft hap- backup.q
to down time and lost data attack methods that are
can be more costly for harder to detect and foil,
smaller companies than for she says.
larger businesses — an av- A company’s computers
erage of $763 per affected can be invaded indirectly
computer or other device — a supplier or customer
versus $470, according to a could be attacked and the
2018 study by the Poneman virus or malware is passed
Institute, which researches along if computer systems
data protection. Many are linked. That’s how cy-
small businesses don’t berthieves hacked into the
have sophisticated systems computers of discount re-
to protect themselves from tailer Target in 2013 — they
hackers, viruses, malware broke in after first invading
and what’s called ransom- the system of one of Tar-
ware, which renders files get’s vendors. Target had
inaccessible unless a com- to settle legal claims for
puter user pays thieves to having not protected cus-
release them. And many tomers’ information that
owners aren’t tech-savvy was stolen.
enough to anticipate po- Smaller businesses are likely
tential problems or don’t to be even more vulner-
make use of technology able, Burley says, adding
staffers or outside help to that “it is the responsibility
strengthen their defenses. of the business to be aware
After the attack, Empire re- that those things can hap-
assessed its security. “We pen.”
already had antivirus pro- Sometimes the invasion is
tection, but we upgraded more low-tech. Jay Ma-
everything — we added rose, who has a Los Ange-
more layers of security,” les-based publicity busi-
Shmanskis says. ness, allowed a longtime
Empire’s experience shows friend who was also a cli-
why it’s critical for small ent to use his password to
businesses to keep strong access his website-building
defenses against cyber- account. The friend logged
criminals. into the account after their
“The nature of the threat work relationship ended,
continues to evolve,” says took files that didn’t be-
Diana Burley, a professor long to him and reversed
at George Washington Uni- his payment to Marose. The
versity’s Graduate School incident cost the publicist