In October, ICAEW held its first Cybercrime Week, as part of Cyber Security Awareness Month. The week generated a variety of resources which were shared over five days and particularly aimed at smaller organisations. The resources bring together expertise from across ICAEW, including the Tech Faculty, the Financial Services Faculty and our Economic Crime team, as well as third parties such as the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), the City of London Police, Barclays and insurance brokers Marsh Commercial.
The growing threat
While the need for good cyber security is not new, the growth of threats and attacks through the pandemic has made it a critical issue for many businesses. According to the NCSC, ransomware attacks have increased threefold during the pandemic. A recent survey showed that ‘smishing’ attacks increased by 700% in the same time period – most of us have probably received a fake SMS message about a non-existent parcel or failed delivery over the past year.
Cybercrime Week covered five themes and picked up on a wide range of issues and perspectives: understanding the threat; good cyber hygiene; fraud; response and recovery; and people and training. Hybrid working and the impact of the pandemic also featured as a key reason for heightened threats and new vulnerabilities.
The central message is that cyber threats are relevant to everyone, and we should all be worried about the actions of cyber criminals. But by taking simple steps, you can significantly improve your protection and make yourself a more difficult target.
Highlights and resources
All of the resources are available on demand.
Here are suggestions to check out if you want to improve your cyber security.
- National Cyber Security Centre resources
The NCSC provides a summary of its key resources targeted at smaller organisations. Its Cyber Aware campaign is the simplest set of advice, with just six steps, and is aimed at sole practitioners. The Small Business Guide provides the next level of guidance, and the NCSC also highlights the key provisions of its recovery planning guide. In addition, you’ll find a variety of short videos on topics such as phishing. - Ransomware
Listen to a podcast that takes you through a real-life ransomware incident. We hear about the sheer panic that sets in when you realise you’ve been the victim of such an attack, the disagreements at board level over whether to pay the ransom and some good practices to put in place to protect yourself. - Fraud
In this webinar, John Heaver from Barclays talks about the kind of fraud attempts they are seeing perpetrated on SMEs in particular, the impact of the pandemic and hybrid working, and some of the things you can do to protect yourself from cyber-based fraud.
There are also articles and interviews with expert members.
About the author
Kirstin Gillon, Technical Manager, Tech Faculty
