Network Security – Protecting The Home Users, Smes And Large Enterprises

By Author: eccuni
Total Articles: 211
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Nowadays, the computer and the Internet play huge roles in running businesses, whether it is at-home, small, medium or large enterprises. The computer and the Internet is used in marketing and presenting the products, studying the market, interacting with clients and most of all conducting transactions with clients or business partners.
With the great importance of Internet and computer in running any business, clearly there is a huge importance of securing the network particularly those networks where sensitive and important data has been stored. In fact, it is very common in every news headlines, publications or televisions that computer networks from different companies have suffered security breaches and that lead to huge losses in their financial and social status in the business world.
This is why it is important to have a network security service that not only checks the vulnerabilities in the system but also protect those vulnerabilities from being exploited, much better if the services can prevent any attack from ever happening to the company. What do you think will happen when clients lost their important ...
... information when they were conducting business with you?
Yes, it is embarrassing but it is just the start. Since the system has been compromised you will have to pay huge amount of money just to fix the system, perform computer forensics, strengthen security and recover the stolen data. The company's reputation will be damaged and it could lead to loss of investments and customers which could lead to the company's downfall. So how can an at-home, small, medium or large enterprise protect their networks?
In fact, the answer should never be hard because there are many ways to protect and secure computer networks. Some attacks that threaten most business are when hackers steal the credit card or personal information of the clients of the business or exploiting their social security numbers. So in order to prevent this from ever happening companies and institutions must perform a regular security audit on their system. Large companies and institutions like hospitals and universities are required to accomplish this task. However, there are some businesses that do not have the enough resources to perform this task and these are small and medium enterprises making them the most vulnerable to these attacks.
Since hackers will employ different means for them to breach or gain access to the company's system; companies must replicate all or at least most of those methods when auditing their security system. An audit on the system will check the vulnerabilities or weaknesses of the system's structure; this is what every security expert and digital computer forensics professional call as penetration testing. Penetration testing is all about isolating each security threat, whether it is mild, moderate or critical; furthermore, it is used to determine the best set of actions against each threat.
In a pen test, the key areas of the system have to be targeted to completely enforce the company's network security. It will help prevent any financial loss from frauds, hackers or extortionists or the lost of revenue because of unreliable business processes and systems. Not complying with the　recommendation could possibly lead to loss of important data, penalties, bad reputation from the media and the public sector and ultimately losing the business. For the employees, it could mean losing the job and if a certain employee is the source of the problem, he or she would face prosecution and possibly land behind bars.
When it comes to regular home user or at-home businesses, there are a few basic details one has to accomplish, particularly if they have a wireless network system in their home. There are easy and effective ways to protect the network from hackers and other users who want to piggyback on the system.
Add security by changing the SSID or the name of the network. Disable SSID broadcast and DHCP Control Mac Address Filtering. Add more security in your system by adding WEP encryption to block other mechanisms and means of the hackers. And further improve your security by setting a random 10 characters pre-shared key to ensure that the network is safe and secured; locked by a random mix of numbers and also letters. Together with effective firewall and anti-virus software, at-home businesses can strengthen the security of their system, no need for any computer forensic course or any other security training, but it won't hurt to have them.

The International Council of E-Commerce Consultants (EC-Council) is a member-based organization that certifies individuals in cybersecurity and e-commerce. It is the owner and developer of 20 security certifications. EC-Council has trained over 90,000 security professionals and certified more than 40,000 members. These certifications are recognized worldwide and have received endorsements from various government agencies. They also offer trainings in computer forensic.
More information about EC-Council is available at www.eccouncil.org.