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Originally Posted On: Why Yorkshire SMEs Can’t Ignore Cybersecurity – The Yorkshire Mafia

It will come as little surprise, but the damage caused by COVID’s disruption has been incalculable for organisations both small and large.

From furloughed staff and shuttered premises to supply chain disruption and weak consumer demand, every organisation has had to reckon with the fallout of the worst pandemic since the Asian Flu in 1957.

Whilst COVID has dominated headlines, however, organisations have continued to grapple with a threat that costs the UK an estimated £27 billion per year. We speak, of course, of cybercrime.

It may be the stuff of big-budget blockbusters and evening news broadcasts, but beyond attention-grabbing breaches of household names lies an insidious reality – a considerable proportion of that headline £27 billion figure relates to small businesses.

Indeed, according to leading insurer Hiscox, a UK small business was breached every 19 seconds in 2019, amounting to 4,500 successful attacks every single day. With 60% of small businesses folding within six months of a cyberattack, the need to act is dire.

Unfortunately, traditional solutions like firewalls that small businesses deploy don’t address the fact that 90% of breaches occur due to simple human error.

That’s where online cybersecurity awareness training comes in.

Put simply, by training your team to understand their essential role in protecting your organisation you can dramatically reduce your risk of breaches and develop a new and positive culture around cybersecurity.

Our research has found that by deploying targeted training, you can reduce your risk of breaches by up to 74%. Weighed against the risk of falling victim to a successful breach, the decision is clear.

For larger organisations, such training is commonplace. However, among SMEs, the practice is shockingly rare. Government studies found that only 21% of micro firms and 37% of small firms had any form of cybersecurity training in the last 12 months.

Compared to the 73% of large firms that have deployed such training to their teams, it becomes clear why cybercriminals see SMEs as such low hanging fruit.

At Bob’s Business, we’re a proud Yorkshire company, one which has been helping organisations to deploy cybersecurity awareness training since 2007. Along the way, we’ve worked with major organisations like MoneySuperMarket, HM Government, BAFTA, DogsTrust and many more.

Now, we’ve pioneered a new training solution aimed exclusively at SMEs. Called Bob’s Compliance, it’s built to offer full access to our 50+ strong catalogue of engaging, entertaining and effective cybersecurity and compliance training products for a low monthly fee. We think of it like Netflix, if Netflix helped you reduce your risk of breaches and achieve compliance with GDPR, ISO 27001, PCI-DSS and more.