Raise Your Security Awareness

Jun. 23, 2003

A recent Inc. Magazine article told an interesting business story. The short version goes something like this: A sign company’s clients start getting calls from competition and the competition knows what items have been bought recently. The competitor offers a lower price for the same items next time. This goes on for months. It turns out that the competitor was digging through the sign company's garbage and stealing old invoices, memos with typos, and other pieces of information. Yipe. 

Security is needed everywhere in many different forms. As Inc. puts it, “The fact is, it doesn’t matter what business you’re in: If you’re making money, you’ve got information that somebody else wants.” Vigilance is not something we should forget in this area. 

Here are four things that can help you stay on top of your security:

1. Determine What Needs to be Protected. If you wouldn’t want your competitor to see a piece of information, secure it, shred it, or lock it up. 
2. Inform Your Staff. Tell everyone what kinds of information they should and shouldn’t pass on. 
3. Good Employee Practices. Get non-disclosure agreements signed by all your employees and remind departing employees of what their obligations are during exit interviews. 
4. Make It Difficult For the Bad Guys. Develop processes that will help validate anyone who requests information that is sensitive and don’t leave important data lying around.