As we enter the spooky season, there are events scarier than ghosts and ghouls. One of the most spine-chilling things anyone can face is a data breach. Fortunately, October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month. For over 20 years, this campaign has encouraged individuals and organizations to take practical steps to reduce cybersecurity risks.
Led by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), this year’s Cybersecurity Awareness Month theme, as our nation celebrates its 250th anniversary, is “Securing the Next 250,” a call to build a secure digital future for the USA. Let’s dive in together to see how you can participate in Cybersecurity Awareness Month to make your organization more secure, inside and out!
Protect More Than Your Passwords This Cybersecurity Awareness Month
When one thinks of cybersecurity, the most common trains of thought include strong passwords, multi-factor authentication, software updates, phishing scam prevention, and employee education. While all of these are immensely important, it is vital to recognize that cybersecurity doesn’t stop at the computer screen.
A firewall cannot protect a customer file sitting in the recycling bin or an old hard drive stored in a closet. Businesses must extend their cybersecurity practices to protect sensitive information stored on paper and physical media, with the most common being:
- Paper records
- Hard disk drives
- Solid-state drives
- Backup tapes
- USB drives
- External hard drives
- CDs and DVDs
- Old computers and servers
So, where to start?
Start With Secure Paper Shredding
One of the easiest protocols you can start implementing this Cybersecurity Awareness Month is secure paper shredding. Secure paper shredding involves gathering sensitive documents into a secure shred bin for disposal. This shred bin should be locked and have a scheduled shredding protocol to ensure optimal safety. These would include documents like:
- Employee files
- Customer records
- Financial statements
- Tax records
- Medical information
- Contracts
- Printed emails and internal reports
Alternatively, you can adopt a “Shred-It-All” policy, where anything on paper automatically goes into the secure shred bin. This creates a more controlled process than relying on employees to sort or destroy documents individually.
What is Degaussing and When Should You Use It?
The next protocol you could implement this Cybersecurity Awareness Month is degaussing. Degaussing is a form of media destruction. It uses a powerful magnetic field to scramble the magnetic particles of a storage device. Unlike “wiping” or “overwriting,” degaussing permanently erases existing data, making it unreadable.
For organizations disposing of magnetic hard drives or backup tapes, degaussing offers a fast way to permanently disrupt the magnetic data stored on the media. To ensure successful degaussing, CI Information Management uses an EMP1000-HS degausser, a model with built-in verification systems and NSA approval.
It is important to note that degaussing is compatible with magnetic media only. It is not an available choice for solid-state drives, optical media, USB flash drives, SD cards, and some cell phones or tablets.
When Physical Hard Drive Destruction Is the Better Choice
An alternative to degaussing is hard drive destruction. This physical shredding method destroys the storage device itself. It can be used for almost all types of media, including those degaussing cannot support. The drive is essentially crushed, torn, and shredded into pieces that cannot reasonably be reconstructed or reused.
Businesses may choose hard drive destruction when equipment has reached its end-of-life stage, when media has to leave the organization’s control, when the device cannot be degaussed, or when the organization wants irreversible physical destruction.
If you are unsure which media destruction method is right for your business, CI Information Management can provide insights on what’s ideal for your needs.
Use Cybersecurity Awareness Month to Review Your Data Disposal Plan
With this information under your belt, we encourage you to use Cybersecurity Awareness Month as a chance to review your organization’s security protocols and data disposal plans. We highly suggest business leaders ask:
- Do we know where sensitive information is stored?
- Are confidential paper records going into secure containers?
- Do employees know what should be shredded?
- Are old computers, drives, or backup media sitting in storage?
- Do we know whether those devices contain HDDs, SSDs, or other media?
- Do we have a documented process for retiring IT equipment?
- Are we using an appropriate destruction method?
- Can we document that destruction occurred?
Remember, cybersecurity is strongest when protection of sensitive data persists throughout its entire lifecycle, from creation to final destruction.
Protect Your Data from Beginning to End
Don’t become another scary statistic in a security breach report! This Cybersecurity Awareness Month, make end-of-life data part of your security plan. Contact CI Information Management to schedule secure document shredding, degaussing, or hard drive and media destruction for your business.
