New research from the Council of Small Business Organisations of Australia’s (COSBOA) Cyber Wardens program reveals the cybersecurity bad habits prevalent among Australian small businesses.
The study, based on a survey of more than 2000 Australian small businesses, aims to raise awareness of the common pitfalls that could expose small businesses to potential threats, data breaches and financial losses and empower them to enhance their cyber resilience by building simple cyber-safe habits into their daily business lives.
The research notes that as many as 78 per cent of small-business owners practise habits that inadvertently make them more vulnerable to cybercrimals. Five habits have been identified in particular:
- 27 per cent of small businesses put their computers in ‘sleep mode’ rather than shutting them down, increasing the risk of out-of-date software giving access to cyber criminals.
- 26 per cent reuse the same passwords across multiple systems and platforms and about 16 per cent also use short passwords, making them easier to crack.
- 21 per cent are deleting suspicious emails they think could be scams without alerting IT or the head of their business.
- 20 per cent share passwords between team members.
- 18 per cent tend to ‘snooze’ software updates.
According to Scamwatch, Australians lost more than $429 million to scams in 2023, with phishing, false billing, online shopping scams and identity theft the most commonly reported scams. In a related report, the ACCC reported the number of businesses losing money to scams increased by 73 per cent in the last year.
“It’s hard to remain vigilant, so this is a reminder on how to avoid slipping into bad habits and instead build good habits that improve your business culture of simple cyber security,” COSBOA CEO, Luke Achterstraat, said. “Through the Cyber Wardens program, we are encouraging small business owners to make simple swaps in the everyday habits of their businesses as the easiest way to kickstart your new year cyber safety plan.”
Rebecca Warren, Executive General Manager Small Business Banking, Commonwealth Bank warned that scams and fraud can have a devastating impact on small businesses, both fnancially and emotionally.
“While the prevalence of scams continues to rise, recent CommBank data shows anti-scam initiatives announced by the bank over the past year are making a real difference for customers, with CommBank protecting retail and business customers from more than $228 million scam attempts through its early prevention and detection program,” Warren said.
“People are the first line of defence when it comes to payment scams which is why the Cyber Wardens program to upskill small businesses in cyber safety, so small businesses can build resilience from the ground up, is such an important initiative,” she added.
Amanda Hutton, Group Executive of Telstra Business, said that her organisation encourages all small businesses who want to improve their cyber resilience this year to enrol in the free Cyber Wardens program, describing the program as “full of excellent resources and simple tips to help small-business owners and their teams build strong cyber-safe habits”.
The free, government-funded Cyber Wardens program provides training to small-business owners and employees on how to digitally safeguard their businesses. This includes essential upskilling on the fundamentals of multi-factor authentication, password management, device updates and backups.
