Big businesses are getting increasingly better cybersecurity and small businesses that are unable or unwilling to pay for better means of protection are being left behind. This is harmful to both the large and small businesses. When hackers are unable to breach large companies, they attack smaller, unprepared targets. Once the hackers breach the small business, they may be able to gain access to bigger businesses data. For example, the infamous Target breach in which 40 million peoples’ credit card data was stolen was not a mistake on Targets end, but rather their HVAC vendor. Nonetheless Target had to pay the $39 million settlement.
While there has been a noticeable increase in cybersecurity spending for small businesses in the last few years, it is not enough to combat the growing problem of viruses and ransomware. Small businesses should conduct regular risk audits to make sure all of their systems are up to date, as well as regularly backing up files in order to mitigate the damage of a possible attack.