Cyber-attacks are on the rise all over the world. Criminals attempt to hack into business systems to gain access to personal data that can be used to commit fraudulent activities. Although bigger businesses usually hold a lot more customer information, smaller business can be at risk too. Criminals may take over your website without you knowing and install software to collect any customer data that is submitted on your websites. These are some top tips to keep your website, your customers and their data safe from malicious activity.

Choose a Good Website Host and Developer

If you are going to outsource your website design and hosting, then do your research on the best hosts and developers in your field. A law firm may want to choose a developer that specializes in lin law firm web design. A company operating in this field will be familiar with the requirements and levels of security your website should have. They may also be able to recommend specific hosting packages that are tailored to different industries and websites that have traffic from certain countries. 

Check for Updates and Update Frequently

If you are using a website platform like WordPress then you will need to be checking for updates as often as possible. Sometimes you can sign-up for email updates to be told when elements need updating. 

The most common updates that are required on a WordPress website are the plug-ins. Some of these can be updated as often as once a week. Included in updates, whether they are for themes or plug-ins, are often security patches as well as new features and bug fixes. This stops hackers being able to exploit old or defective code to take over your website. 

Encrypt Customer Data

If you are dealing with any type of customer data, especially personal data such as names, addresses and bank details, it is vital that it’s encrypted. This will ensure that should your website get hacked and have data stolen, criminals won't be able to make use of the data they stole. Encrypting your website with HTTPS will stop hackers being able to inject software into your website and read your information. 

If you are taking payments on your website, it might be a good idea to sign up with a payment provider like Stripe or PayPal. This way you will not need to store any payment data on your website. All of the payment data is stored on these websites, leaving you to just collect and store names, emails, and delivery addresses. 

Insist on Strong Passwords

Some of the responsibility for protecting customer data can be put onto your customers. However, you need to provide them with the means to do so. If your customers have to create an account with your website then you should make sure that they can only choose very strong passwords for their account. Letting them choose something like password1 will not provide adequate protection. 

Passwords should have a mixture of upper case and lower-case letter along with at least one number. They should also have at least one special character too. Passwords should also be different for different accounts and websites where possible and not be anything personal like a name.