Penetration testing or ethical hacking, as it is sometimes called, is by far one of the best methods to strengthen your business’s cybersecurity.
A penetration test, which is also known as a pen test, is a cyber-attack on a computer system which is authorised by the system’s owner in order to evaluate the security of that system.
The test highlights vulnerabilities, and resilience, including the potential for unauthorised access – i.e. hacking – to get into the system.
It has been shown that 33% of businesses have lost customers because of a data/malware breach.
This kind of security incident will further add to the costs of the potential damages and fines from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), but it can also have a massive negative impact the reputation of your business, which is considerably harder and more expensive to recover from. We all know that it costs more to get new clients and past customers back than it does to retain them them.
If you lose sensitive/personal information or financial data of your customers, possibly even be responsible for them being breached as well, all the effort and cost invested could be lost from just one cyber-attack.
Therefore, running regular penetration tests will play a crucial role in securing critical information and sensitive data.
We would never claim that this is a perfect solution that will block every single cyber threat, nobody is 100% secure. However, pen testing can help you discover a whole raft of vulnerabilities in your networks, systems, websites and applications before hackers discover them.
We will be publishing a series of blogs looking at the role pen testing plays in the protection and privacy of your clients and your business data.
Please get in touch to chat about any aspect as your cyber security.
