By Jared Thompson, Marketing Manager, North West Cyber Resilience Centre
21st October 2021

Over the last 18 months, we have seen a well-evidenced acceleration towards businesses working with a more hybrid model – and more entrepreneurs have starting businesses from their bedrooms during the pandemic.

We’ve worked remotely ourselves at the North West Cyber Resilience Centre - between March 2020 and July 2021 we worked remotely with online meetings, ran webinars and guested on virtual events with partners from across the region.

Whilst the current roadmap has seen more businesses move back into the office, for many, the risks of having to deal with a cyber incident are still when not if.

The changing landscape of working from home

With people working from home almost exclusively in the first half of 2020, criminals took advantage of the changing landscape for businesses. Criminals attacked those companies who were transitioning staff from office to working from home. They exploited vulnerabilities where devices had out of date software or updates, where staff had weak passwords or passwords that were repeated and didn’t have two-factor authentication enabled.

Online fraud moved away from other government scams we are used to seeing, such as with the HMRC. Cybercriminals instead focused their efforts on a variety of covid scams; the furlough scheme, business relief payments, covid testing kits, vaccine appointments and more recently with vaccine passports.

This year’s Cyber Security Breaches Survey from the DCMS showed that 39% of micro and small businesses have identified cyber security breaches or attacks in the last 12 months.

The most common type of cyber attack for businesses, charities, schools and colleges is still phishing emails (of the 39% who identified any breaches or attacks, 83% had experienced phishing attacks). The impact of small businesses and their staff not being aware of what phishing scams look like or the links they shouldn’t click can mean that criminals gain access to; login credentials, payment information or the keys to a business’ network.

For the small businesses we work with, dealing with a cyber-attack doesn’t just mean a loss of reputation or the financial impact, it can see their business having shut their doors. This can then lead to the mental impact of losing a business they may have built and worked on for their whole life.

That’s why the Cyber Resilience Centre is so vital as part of the North West business community, we believe digital harm is real harm. We want to ensure every small business in the region has access to the knowledge, skills and tools to help protect themselves from online crime.

That’s why we signpost businesses to our free police and government-backed guidance and affordable services and membership. It’s why we’re pleased to offer businesses in Greater Manchester the opportunity to take advantage of our new fully-funded program of support.

The programme offers businesses several cyber security policy & procedure templates, alongside a security awareness training session for their staff.

The Business Resilience programme is open to all Greater Manchester-based small businesses, a deep understanding of cyber security, online or digital technology is not needed.

This programme has been funded by the Asset Recovery Incentive Scheme, supported by Greater Manchester Police.

Businesses can register to join this program by submitting their details here.