Cybersecurity In San Francisco Nonprofit Organizations

Nonprofits and Cybersecurity: Tips for Handling Cybersecurity in San Francisco Nonprofit Organizations

Nonprofit organizations do so much to help our world. Focused on helping specific aspects of our world, whether other people in need, animals, the environment or other causes, these organizations do a great deal to help us improve our world and our society. However, that doesn't mean that they can't fall victim to cybersecurity attacks, which can deliver a disheartening blow to the organization's human resources. Because they are often very dependent on donations from philanthropists or the general public, nonprofit organizations collect a great deal of information from their donors. This can lead to a much higher risk of cyberattacks than would otherwise be expected. How should cybersecurity in San Francisco Nonprofit Organizations be handled?

Some of these organizations are local, while others have chapters spread across the country or around the world. How do the largest of these organizations protect the information they've collected, especially as they've adapted to using remote work environments to keep their missions rolling forward? Here's a quick overview of some key digital security concepts that can help protect your information, your volunteers and your donor and client base.

Nonprofits and Cybersecurity: Tips for Handling Cybersecurity in San Francisco Nonprofit Organizations

Streamline Your Organization's Technology

It can be easy to layer new technology platforms as they come out, but if you limit the number of platforms you're using, your organization can see big benefits. Limiting the number of platforms can reduce your required training time and ongoing troubleshooting. This also allows you to properly vet the applications, ensuring that you have the best possible security practices in place while reigning in unnecessary costs. Consider publishing short training videos and tutorials about the platforms that you use, serving as a reference for frequently-asked questions, new employees or for onboarding volunteers.

Start Using Multi-Factor Authentication

Because of the coronavirus and increased working from home, social engineering attacks and phishing emails have increased dramatically, increasing your organization's risk of a serious cyberattack. If you add multi-factor authentication, you can mitigate how many of these attacks can potentially succeed in your digital assets while removing some portion of the aspect of human error or curiosity from the equation, reducing the risk that you'll lose important donors due to a data breach.

Watch Over Your User Access Control

Because more employees and volunteers are working remotely than ever before, you need to stay on top of who has access to your systems and for what reasons. You should monitor employee access to your systems, shutting down access when it is no longer needed. If an employee or volunteer leaves the organization, shut down all access to avoid potential breeches through old accounts. This also helps you limit possible access points for hackers to enter your system.

Keep Running Vulnerability Scans on Connected Devices

It can be virtually impossible to lock down your employees' or volunteers' home networks, especially as some schools continue to work remotely due to the pandemic. Though you can only provide so much control of these networks, you can make sure that connected devices to these networks are regularly scanned to reduce the risk of an attack due to a vulnerability.

Rethink Your Bring Your Own Devices (BYOD) Options

If your nonprofit faced a sudden transition to remote work, personal devices may be used more frequently than in the past. Because these devices are potentially vulnerable, they need to be protected and managed to prevent cyberattacks. Now that things have begun to settle in for the long term, it may be worth rethinking your work from home plans and see about setting up dedicated devices for your employees or reviewing how employees are using personal devices to access your nonprofit's applications and files.

Make the Change to Cloud-Based Infrastructure

Setting up a cloud-based environment for employees and volunteers to securely access and share information quickly can make a huge difference in your organization's digital security. By delivering higher levels of security and protection, this approach can deliver solid results, especially if you pair it with multi-factor authentication and a range of other security protocols. It will also deliver solid results in the future when you have employees and leadership traveling for a range of reasons who need to connect to your existing infrastructure on the go.

Perform a Security Assessment

Do you know that your organization needs better cybersecurity but don't know where to start? A security assessment helps you figure this issue out, along with helping you determine a budget for any changes that need to take place. Consider taking time to look into cloud security and audit your current vendors to ensure you understand their security protocols - a vendor who won't allow the audit may have other issues that you'll want to walk away from.

See What Other Organizations are Doing

If you don't know where to start in terms of improving your cybersecurity and overall digital strategy, consider looking at what other organizations are doing that have established a solid cybersecurity strategy. Reach out and have lunch with some of their IT leadership to ask some of the questions you have to improve your knowledge of the possible issues you're facing, then ask how they're handling cybersecurity. You may find that they're using an internal, external, or combination IT team to get the job done. This allows you to get up-to-speed quickly without wasting money on bad solutions.

By having a solid idea of what kind of concerns can arise for cybersecurity in San Francisco nonprofit organizations, you can better defend against these types of attacks, keeping your client and donor details protected against potential data breaches and other risks. If you need help finding the right solutions for your nonprofit organization, the experienced IT professionals at OnTimeTech can help you find the best options for your needs. Reach out today with any questions, for information, or to schedule a consultation for the best plan of action for your organization.