Aftermath of the Crowdstrike outage: stay safe from scams
Safe guard your business against phishing scams in the wake of the CrowdStrike outage.
A cyber breach may be closer to home than you realise...
Starting and running a business is an exciting and busy time. While cyber security might seem like something larger corporations must worry about, small businesses have been exposed to recent attacks. The good news is that there are things you can do to stay protected.
With the recent CrowdStrike global outage, the Australian Government has called for small businesses to be on the lookout for phishing scams. These types of scams are designed to trick business owners into giving access to important business information. Female business owners have been found less likely to be scammed than their male counterparts, but it’s important to stay alert to phishing scams to protect all your hard-earned work.
Four key steps to protect your business today
Chat to your team today
Scammers took the opportunity and started planning as soon as the CrowdStrike outage happened. You may have already seen concerning emails come through or received calls urging you to ‘check your system today’. If you have a team, grab them today to catch up and share this article with everyone in your business. Talking regularly about cyber safety keeps it in front of mind and ahead of scams and hacks before any damage is done.
Stop, Check and Protect
Phishing scams come through emails, text messages, direct messages on social media, and phone calls. Be cautious about any unsolicited emails, phone calls, or direct messages. A helpful mantra to take is STOP, CHECK & PROTECT.
STOP: Don’t feel rushed into clicking a link, downloading software or providing personal or financial information.
CHECK: Verify who you are talking to. Call your IT support or financial institution to check if its legitimate
PROTECT: Act quickly if you have provided access to private information. Contact your bank immediately and report to scamwatch.gov.au to help protect others.
Know the red flags
Scammers often encourage a sense of urgency to create pressure and lead you into clicking and complying with scam messages.
This article can help you familiarise yourself with 7 red flags to spot scams.
Follow the cyber safey essentials
Free resources are available to master the cyber basics to equip your small business with cyber risks. For more information on better equipping your small business against cyber risks, you can enrol in their free program to build a cyber-smart small business workforce.
Jessica Ritchie
