Your company just faced a major Security breach?

Ok, that’s pretty devastating, however, this doesn’t need to be the end of the road. While data breaches could be pretty damaging for your company’s reputation, the way you bounce back and deal with the fallout can go a long way. So, in this article, let’s see what you should do following the attack.

#1 Make sure that it is truly over

Before you even do anything please make sure that the attack is well and truly over. Identify the affected instances and isolate them from the rest of your system. If your internal team lacks the expertise to fix the situation, you may need to hire external security experts.

#2 Audit, audit, and more audit

So you have made sure that the attack is well and truly over. Now you need to know exactly what happened during the attack. What can really help you here is a thorough Audit of all the data accessed by the attackers? This will help you in accessing the damage done to your company. In particular, this will help you discover if the attacker modified or simply read your data.

You will probably need to update security controls of your unaffected systems, such as changing the passwords. If you haven’t updated your security software lately, then it may be time for you to do so. It’s also important to take precautions like turning on two-factor authentication.

#3 Monitor your accounts closely.

Along with making sure that the attack is well and truly over, you must keep an eye out for the amount of damage that the attacker has already done with the data they have stolen. While you won’t be able to know when the attacker plans to use the data, it is still important to keep an eye out for this.

#4 Let the customers know

This is the scariest part of the whole process, but you need to announce the breach to your customers and the public. While it absolutely sucks being the bearer of bad news, a good communication plan will help you win back the people’s respect. Plus, disclosing a breach of customer data is the law in all 50 states and Washington DC, and it’s an element of GDPR as well, so it’s definitely in your best interest to disclose the breach as fast as possible.

When you communicate the attack, you need to understand that your customers won’t care about how their data got breached. This is why it is crucial to communicate the essentials. Use this opportunity to clearly convey your message. Your customers should trust you and believe that you have what it takes to rectify this situation.

#5 Learn and never repeat this again

If your company has just suffered from one single breach, it will still be possible for you to regain your customer’s trust. However, it will be nearly impossible for you to do so if you suffer another breach all over again. After suffering your first breach, you must formulate a breach prevention plan and make sure that it includes systems to aid you in the early detection of such incidents.

Conclusion

The aftermath of a breach is a natural time to re-evaluate your security. You need to treat such incidents for what they really are – lessons that will help you grow. Not only will attacks like these toughen you up for the future, but it will also teach you the valuable lesson of timely and critical customer communication. If you want to learn about securing your company’s attack surface, then you can do so by checking if your cloud storage has been properly configured or not. Luckily, we have written an article on this exact same topic which you can check here.

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