Hello! If you are new to this series please start with Day 1 or if you missed any other days they can all be found Here. If you are all caught up, welcome back to Day 3 where we will spend the next 5 minutes continuing to incrementally improve our small business security situation with a digital assessment.
Please go through each of the assets, which you created on Day 1, and rank them, on a scale of 1-3, in terms of how harmful it would be if any of the following happened (3 is most harm): you lose the asset completely, you lose control over what is stored there, or it becomes viewable by a person who wished to do harm to your business, your employees, your customers or your business partners. In creating this ranking consider the following:
Small Business Security
- To what extent do you rely on this asset to transact business (main website, inventory control system, file storage system, online bank account, etc.)
- Does this asset store personal information (yours, your employees, your customers, your partners)? –
Note personal information includes: Name, Email, Phone, Address, SSN, CC#, medical info, political affiliation, etc. - Does this asset contain any competitive information (schematics, trade secrets, user list, etc.)
- Does this asset connect to another organization’s network? could you face legal liability for failing to protect it?
That’s it for today! If you want to do a bit extra – try to figure out how many people you possess personal information about.
Note – You may want to ask any other informed stakeholders to go through the same process and compare notes.
Be sure to come back for Day Four / Part Four – Digital Asset Protection