Cybersecurity firm SensCy recently released their SMO Cybersecurity Readiness Report, which uses 2023 data from small and medium-size businesses (SMOs) across various sectors nationwide. The report explored cybersecurity assessments—based on the National Institute of Technology Standards (NIST) framework—of hundreds of businesses with fewer than 1,000 employees, measuring their ability to identify and protect their organization against online threats as well as their action plan should an attack happen.
Co-founder Dave Kelly
The report was published just ahead of October’s Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Ultimately, the report concluded: “With alarming statistics on insufficient cyber insurance, inadequate training, and weak incident response plans, this report underscores the urgent need for enhanced cybersecurity measures.”
According to the findings, a staggering 77 percent of SMOs assessed did not follow baseline cybersecurity practices, leaving them vulnerable to scams, phishing, and ransomware attacks. SensCy notes that cyberattacks on SMOs have escalated, up 424 percent in 2023 from the previous year.
Co-founder David Behen
Additionally, nearly 45 percent of respondents said they did not conduct any internal or external vulnerability scans, while 65 percent of companies indicated that they had no formal policies to train employees to be aware of these types of threats.
While the report is indeed alarming, there were some bright spots that SMOs are taking their security seriously: 70 percent of respondents had a firewall in place, and companies that adopted best practices were able to improve their score by 4X to 10X within a matter of months.
The full report is available here.
SensCy—a portmanteau of “sensible cyber”—was founded by former two-term Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, who also has extensive experience in corporate America as a venture capitalist as well as president and chairman of PC manufacturer Gateway. He, along with his two other founders, Dave Kelly, SensCy CTO and former Commander of the Michigan Cyber Command Center, and David Behen, SensCy’s Chief Client Success Offer and former CIO of the State of Michigan and La-Z-Boy, built SensCy to help arm small and medium-size businesses create and implement proactive cyber programs with easy-to-understand solutions to better protect them against online attacks. Collectively, the SensCy executive team has more than a century of IT and cybersecurity experience.
Using their proprietary SensCy Score, which measures points of vulnerability within an organization, SensCy offers custom guidance to reduce risk, implement safeguards, and nurture a culture of awareness in case of an attack. You can assess your own company with their free online test here.
Visit senscy.com for more information.
[09.17.24]