Spark Lab helps SMEs stay cyber safe

Spark's a digital business mentor programme, Spark Lab, is offering what it describes as a free tool to help businesses assess their cyber-security readiness, and identify and remedy their cyber security weak spots.

Spark’s security lead, Josh Bahlman said a run of the tool took only five minutes and would will quickly show SMEs how exposed they were in comparison to other companies.”

The tool is a questionnaire in which the user is asked about their company's cyber security and general IT practices such as updating.

On completion of the questionnaire users can download a guide to creating an incident management plan, a cyber security policy template and see a list of Spark's cyber security products.

“Small-to-medium business owners are struggling to stay ahead of the cyber-security curve," Bahlman said.

"SME business owners attention is often turned to more attractive tech categories such as lead-generation, IoT and mobile working and in turn, cyber-security readiness remains on the back-burner – but that needs to change." 

“One in four kiwi businesses were a target of cyber-crime last year and that number is growing,” he said, citing the 2017 Norton SMB Cyber Security Survey.

He added: “Cyber-security should become synonymous with commercial health and safety practises and codes. Implementing best practice security processes will become a crucial step for any growing business. 

“Security should be a matter of hygiene for any SME. Turning on something as simple and cost-effective as two-factor authentication could be the difference between a scammer getting access to sensitive information or more so, not getting access to sensitive information.”